Thanks for checking out the Anchor Faith Message podcast
from St. Augustine, FL.
Now enjoy this message. Turn over to 1st John chapter
four. First John chapter 4, we're
going to talk about some spiritual insight.
Anybody wants some spiritual insight?
Wouldn't you love to have some spiritual insight?
I'm talking accurate spiritual insight, right?
Some spiritual insights. So we're going to deal with some
Kingdom discernment today. And 1st John chapter 4, starting
in verse one, it says, beloved, do not believe every spirit, but
test the spirits to see whether they are from God, OK?
And we've been dealing with some thought processes here because
again this year God spoke to us about the reigning spirit.
We have the Holy Ghost, He is the reigning spirit, but there
are other spirits, OK? And so John communicates this in
his first letter here concerning that when you're hearing things,
you need to test because everything talking to you isn't
necessarily from God. Just because you're born again
doesn't mean the devil cannot talk to you nor those that are
with him, which would be unclean spirits, right?
All kinds of different spirits that are in that area of his
influence, domain of darkness. So you have to test it, which
means think about that word test for a moment.
No one wants to take a test without having the information
to pass it, which tells us if you're not studying, you will
fail the test. OK, so when he says test the
Spirit, you need to be a studier of the word, rightly dividing
the word of truth so that you can pass the test to know that's
not from God. That's not a thought from God,
because the devil comes as an Angel in life.
The devil uses Scripture right and some a lot of babes in
Christ. OK carnal Christians are babes
in Christ. They're very susceptible to
other spirits when they lead with Scripture are terms that
are associated with God. Again, this is laughable, but
I'd always like to tell it when I was a youth pastor in Starke,
FL, actually, you know, we had a little praise and worship team
and we ministered to a bunch of teenagers and I had some
teenagers come in from school one day and and it was at
service and was like Pastor Earl, we want to do a new want
you to do a new praise and worship song, you know, and I
said, what's that? It's called heaven let your
light shine down. This was a secular song by
Active Soul. Well, bless their darling
hearts, they were, you know, babes and cries, but they heard
heaven and they were assuming we're talking about the same
place, right? We're not talking about the same
place at all. And we're not singing that song
in service. Okay, so with that being said,
there's a few secular groups that had references, you know,
to have a says just like, you know, I definitely wouldn't sing
Highway to Hell either, but there's a highway to hell.
Are you hearing me? But I'm not going to make it my
worship song. All right, we reference hell
today anyway, so we have to test the spirits and you know, the
spirits will come like light. But when you know Scripture,
then you can say not sure that's the Lord.
So the implication here is if when you find that they're not
from God, then you should disregard their messaging.
I said you should disregard their messaging.
Hallelujah in relationships, spirits talking about lustful
ones. OK, They'll come to a born again
believer and convince them to get in a relationship with an
unbeliever, that that you as a believer are going to change
their life. Yet the scripture says do not be
unequally yoked with unbelievers.
And that lustful spirit will convince them that the only way
they're going to get right is if you go ahead and marry them,
that you need to be around them full time and you're going to
take them to church. There's no guarantee.
In fact, Scripture lets us know. In fact, if you believe that
they can change, let them change first before you say I do.
But now that means you got to put down your feelings and your
emotions, right? And again, then what happens?
Believers say, well, how could it be wrong if it feels so
right? I think that's a country song,
actually. With that being said, you know,
but they live this way by their feelings by sight.
You're not testing the spirits correctly, OK.
And so we need to test the spirits Now.
Why is this important today? Because you say, well, I'm
mature, I hear. Listen, in the last of the last
days, there's going to be seducing spirits and doctrines
of demons. And it said some will fall away
from the faith. So there are believers that are
functioning and flowing with God.
And if by all rights have had seasons of maturity, because
just because you've had a season of maturity doesn't mean you
cannot slide, you can't fall out of maturity.
OK, it's like my natural body. I can't go back to pre
adolescence. That won't ever happen.
But in the spirit it can happen. I mean, you can go slap all the
way back to infancy because we know the Bible says on both Paul
and Peter writing says, listen, I can't I can't even talk to
you, a spiritual. I've got to go back because
you're acting like a baby, Amen. So never think you've arrived.
You can know whether you've reached maturity, but man, then
you've got to maintain maturity and maintaining maturity is a
serious business, serious business.
So we jump down to verse four says this.
You are from God, little children and have overcome them
because greater is he who is in you than he that's in the world.
Isn't that good news? So again, you have within you
the ability to test the spirits of whether or not they are from
God, because you have the reigning spirit not only on the
inside of you if you're born again, but if you believe God
for the endowment of power. He has come upon you and He's
resting on you, not coming upon you and leaving.
He is resting on you with His power because He has given you
the same anointing that Jesus had, and that's the anointing of
a king. Hallelujah.
You have the Spirit of the Lord upon you, which is the spirit of
his government, which is the the ability to hear from your king
and accurately move into the places we're going to talk about
today, which is Kingdom discernment.
All right, Kingdom discernment. I have learned through the
years, it is very important for me to never assume I know and
always keep myself in a position.
Lord, what am I hearing? I think one of the greatest
failures of a mature believer is to assume they net will never
get it wrong. And so they don't keep a
dependency on hearing accurately from God.
And we need to always keep a dependency on hearing accurately
from God. So Revelation chapter one, verse
4 through 6 says this John to the seven churches which are in
Asia, grace to you peace from him who is and who was and who
is to come. Is he coming?
I said, is he coming? The King's coming, and from the
seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ,
the faithful witness, the first born of the dead, the ruler of
the kings of the earth. Who are those kings?
Come on, who are those king? To him who loves us and released
us from our sins by his blood, and he made us to be a Kingdom,
say Kingdom priest to his God and Father.
To Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever.
Amen. Notice there are 7 spirits
before his throne. Revelations 5-6 says yes.
And I saw between the throne with the four living creatures
and and the elder elders of the Lamb standing as if slain,
having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven
spirits of God sent out into all the earth.
And we said this, that horns represented, they represented
rule and authority in, in Revelations, when you hear about
a horn, it's basically a Kingdom, a realm.
There's another type and shadow that they use concerning
government power. That's a mountain.
OK. And then when it says eyes, that
means and, and they use the term 7 because seven is the, is the
number of completion or fullness.
So Jesus Christ is the fullness of all government and the
fullness and authority and fullness of all insight or
wisdom or knowledge. OK.
And then he goes on and says the seven spirits of God.
So obviously we're taking time to break down the seven spirits
of God. But although it's not 7
individual spirits, it is one spirit which is the Holy Spirit,
but he contains within him seven spirits or there's attributes or
characteristics of him. We find these in Isaiah Chapter
11 verse two. It says the Spirit of the Lord
will rest on in him the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the
spirit of counsel and strength, the spirit of knowledge and the
fear of the Lord. Those are the seven spirits that
are before the Lord. So when we talk about the Holy
Spirit, he is the spirit of the Lord, of the Spirit of
government. So the Holy Spirit will only
talk to you about the Kingdom. That's his assignment.
He only says what he hears from the Son, and the Son is only
speaking on behalf of the Father because the Father, Son, and the
Holy Spirit are one and they're always in agreement.
They are never, never are they in disagreement.
In fact, Jesus's greatest moment of submission was not doing what
the Father said because he disagreed.
It was doing what the Father said because he was going to get
in agreement with his Father and put his flesh down and his way
down. OK, so there's a little term
that goes around, you know, when it comes to if you know you're
not really submitted. If you agree with someone, that
is a lie. That is a seducing spirit.
Because for you to believe that you're only submitted when you
do something, though you disagree with someone that is a
rebellious person doing something that is not God does
not have rebellious people. You can't have a rebellion at
heart and yet have an obedient action.
Oh, you're not listening to me. You cannot have a a rebellious
heart and an obedient action because now your action is in
rebellion too. Because he says they confess me
with their list, but their heart is far from me.
And here is the rich young ruler saying, look, what do I need to
do to get eternal life? And he says, just keep the
commandments. And he says, I've done it since
I was a child, right? Which means he did it, but he
did it based upon his heart, not based upon the actual lordship
of Jesus submitted to him. Because if he was truly
submitted to the one who spoke it, then when he said, sell
everything you have, give to the poor and come follow me.
And he said done. But instead he's like, no, I do
it on. I don't really agree with you,
but you hear this eternal life. So I'm going to do it anyway.
So Paul totally capitalizes on this concept in First
Corinthians Chapter 7. He says, I wanted to do right,
but I found whatever I was doing was still wrong.
He said, what a wretched man am I.
I mean, he said, he said, if you put me up against the Pharisees,
I was without blame. I was far beyond my
contemporaries. I had zeal.
I mean when it came to the law found blameless, yet he had a
rebellious heart and did righteous actions, meaning
obedient actions, but to God it was all rebellion.
So again, we pick up these human terms, pull them into the church
and at like now the greatest submission is when we disagree,
but do it anyway. No, Jesus showed the greatest
submission is father. If there any other way, because
I sure won't rebel from you, I would prefer not to go.
And really the only reason why Jesus asked that question is
because there was a ram in the thicket with Abraham.
When Abraham was called to get rid of his only son, God had a
ram in the thicket and he was saying, Father, have we come to
this point because I'm like Abraham?
He was willing to sacrifice him and said God must be able to
raise the dead. And could he?
Yes. Does he?
Yes. Was he going to do Isaac?
No, because he was always going to have a ram.
And what was God saying? It won't require a man to give
his son. I'm won't give mine.
But he tells him in the garden, son, there's not a ram.
You're it. But remember, I'll raise the
dead because he had been saying in three days I'm coming up, in
three days I'm coming up, in three days I'm coming up.
Hallelujah. So what Jesus did said, I'm
going to get fully persuaded because again, how can you have
faith in God and be in rebellion with God at the same time?
How can you say you're a doer of the word, but in your heart you
hate what you're doing? Well, I'll go to church, but I
don't like it. I'm just submitted to God.
Well, you're not submitted to God and you're in church, but
you're a rebellion in church. Come on, come on.
Right. No, the greatest submission is
when you are fully persuaded that God's way is the only way
and I get in alignment with and I believe it with all my heart.
There is no other way and I'm doing so.
I'm in full agreement. So when people say the greatest
submission is to not agree and still do it is seducing Spirit
Salah. The greatest submission is a
green changing your will for the will of the one who has the real
authority and saying I'm here to do it.
I fully submit to it and I'm in agreement with you.
Say I'm in agreement, say I'm in agreement, man, you better be in
agreement with God because the devil slick, he's slick,
especially when it comes to natural things.
Do you understand? The Bible says what good is it a
man to gain the whole world? You don't understand, the devil
has an economy. He has a pathway of promotion.
He always promotes the rebellious, which means if you
have a rebellious heart with a confession in your mouth and
then all of a sudden you get what you confess, God didn't
give it to you. The devil accommodated this fake
belief he's putting you in. I'm preaching better than you're
saying, but that's all right. Because here's the thing we're
going to learn today about this spirit of understanding man
Hallelujah. God knows, you know, you've
heard me say this before. When people say, well, the Lord
knows my heart. You bet He does.
And not one time have you out. Have you faked him out?
Not one time. Never have you faked him out.
Never have. You know, I heard one minister
say it this way. You can fake a praise, but you
can't fake an offering. You know that's not true.
You can fake an offering. You sure can.
Jesus is watching the money come in and the rich people gave out
of their surplus and was faking an offering.
And today's ministers would be applauding the wealthy and
taking no thought to the one with two pennies, 'cause her
heart demonstrated her offering, 'cause you can fake one.
You can drop $10,000 to someone to try to get into their sphere
of influence. Oh, you don't want to hear this,
but they'll say it. You can fake a praise, but you
can't fake an offering. Oh, yeah, you can.
You can fake it all the way into influence and manipulation.
Yeah, you sure can. This is why the Lord says judges
don't take a bribe. Back in the Old coven, what?
They were getting an offering from someone.
This is called special interest today.
Hallelujah. It's called special interest.
Special interest to get all kind of laws passed.
Amen. They're fat, man.
We know. We really appreciate you.
We want to sow into your campaign.
We vow. No, you don't.
You're faking an offering. You're looking for people.
Do it in the church. All right, I'll.
I'll deal with all of them. Amen.
Come on.
Thank you, Jesus. So today we're going to deal
with three of these spirits. Last time we dealt with the
spirit of the Lord. I'm going to deal with three
today and so I'm going to take them, you know, one, they say
that they're kind of in pairs. The last ones after the Spirit
of the Lord, that you have the spirit of wisdom and
understanding, counsel and strength, knowledge and the fear
of the Lord. But I'm going to pull the fear
of the Lord by itself and then jump into the wisdom and
understanding. And This is why in Psalms 111
verse 10, it says this. The fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom, a good understanding.
Have all those who do His commandments, His praise endures
forever. So notice the beginning of
wisdom is the fear of the Lord. So the fear of the Lord is very
important. And when you were born again and
have the Spirit rest upon you, you've been given this spirit.
OK, we do have the Holy Spirit with measure, unlike Jesus
without measure. And when we all come together,
we have it all. But that doesn't mean you're not
having access to the seven characteristics of the Holy
Ghost upon your life. And you need to carry the fear
of the Lord, which tells me the Spirit of God has it.
So then you should yield to it and have it in your in your own
spirit. When I say your own spirit, I'm
talking about the spirit of man that's been created in Christ.
OK Proverbs 1533 says the fear of the Lord is the instruction
for wisdom. OK, and before honor Tom's
humility now let me explain humility real quick.
Humility is not what most churches are ministering on
humidity. All they're just so humble, you
know, not going to take credit for anything, you know let's
just give God, you know, I'm no good.
I don't deserve anything. I'm not.
Oh, I'm just so thank you know, there's a there's A and
arrogance and pride actually of those statements because a lot
of those people who do that aren't technically even in
faith. They're not even believing God.
You know, they're always just trying to make you think they're
not as self-righteous as a lot of times they are.
OK, because that's not the definition of humility.
The definition of humility is I submit my will to his will.
That is humility. To humble yourself before the
Lord is to not my will. Your will be done.
That's humility. And so we see here in this
passage that the fear of the Lord is the instruction for
wisdom, right? Well, if you receive
instruction. What are you doing?
Which is the wisdom gives you instruction.
What does that mean? Then you're going to yield or
humble yourself to function, believe, act that way, and guess
what? It will bring honor into your
life. I mean, Gay Gideon wasn't even
known as a human being other than his family, yet God's had
it, saw something in him and showed up and called him things
that he didn't even believe himself.
But what caused his name to rise among the ranks in his own
nation, where he was the the least family in the least tribe,
of which he himself was the least in his own family?
It's because he humbled himself. Whatever you say I'm going to
do, OK. And so when we do this, it's
important. So the fear of the Lord is the
instruction for wisdom. So we need to understand about
the fear of the Lord if we're going to understand the spirit
of wisdom and spirit of understanding.
So turn over to Isaiah 33 six. Isaiah 33 six says this, and he
will be the stability of your times.
Now this is talking about the king.
Again, Isaiah has a lot to say about King Jesus, right?
And so Isaiah's prophesying of, of the King's coming, and I
don't mean the last one specifically where he sets his
foot down and he does the millennial reign and they you,
you never take him out of the planet physically anymore.
I'm talking about when he comes, period.
Says he'll be the stability of your times, a wealth of
salvation, wisdom and knowledge. The fear of the Lord is his
treasure. Now if Jesus treasures
something, should you treasure it?
Come on. If Jesus considers the fear of
the Lord where his values, what he finds valuable is, you know,
understand a treasure is something that we have
considered valuable. It's our treasure.
I mean, you know, again, there were treasure boxes, people with
high, it has great value. So what was Jesus's greatest
value? The fear of the Lord, the fear
of the Lord now the fear of the Lord is not God is going to kill
me the minute I do something wrong.
He just waiting for me to blow it.
That is not the fear of the Lord.
Okay, that's that's a seducing spirit, a doctrine of demons
trying to, you know, convinced and whole denominations have
changed this whole thing of how to live for God day in and day
out because they're so in fear are not the reverential fear,
but this fear that God's about to knock me down and pull me out
of salve. I could lose it at any time.
It's so so, you know, fragile this relationship that I have
with God, right. If I look at the wrong thing, Oh
my gosh, you know, I mean, it's that's not the fear of the Lord.
OK, it's not the fear of the Lord, but this is a treasure.
So by definition, a few scholars have said it this way.
The fear of the Lord is this is Jesus willful will willingly
kept himself in the in a place of submission, respect and honor
to God the Father. Now that's key.
Jesus willingly did this, not forced, not controlled by.
Jesus had a will and we see it clearly in Scripture.
In the garment he says Lord not my will, but your will be done.
And he said on multiple counts, I don't speak anything on my
initiative, but only what I've heard from the Father, which
means he could have spoke on his own thoughts, but he did not.
He yielded to the thoughts of his Father.
He was always in this place of submission, respect, and honor
to God the Father. That's what the fear of the Lord
are you in a place of submission, respect, and honor
to God the Father? If you are, then you're
functioning under the spirit of the fear of the Lord.
The fear of the Lord also means this.
It means reverential awe, which prompts to obedience, which
prompts to obedience. And in my own personal life, I
mean, I have been, I stay up underneath this.
I can't tell you how many times in conflict that at the end of
the day, I know what my flesh is saying, I know what I want to
say. I know how what's gone down, but
I just need to stay in a place of obedience, period.
I need to stay in the place of obedience.
So what does that look like? And most of the time, it's
crucify the flesh. Don't say that.
Don't respond that way. Don't come back that way.
Don't attack that way. Yeah.
And you know, the minute you yield that way, then the other
spirits are saying you're going to look like this, this, this.
And you know what? You look like that.
I get it. You look like it.
I understand, but the reverential fear, it prompts me
to obedience. I'm just going to have to do
what God says here. It's isn't about me.
It's not about because if God can't take care of my character,
if he can't take care of my reputation.
I mean, do you understand is all that's going on in the body of
Christ today, especially in the realm of of of infants, carnal
Christians, wolves. I mean, there's so many things
that attack Jesus Christ is still building his church and
there is a pure, I would say a pure bloodline of his church in
the planet still today. You understand, don't equate the
fact that things are happening that God is well with it.
He's just very merciful. He's very merciful and
long-suffering. But in the end, the purity of
everyone who followed is going to rise to the top.
It's just going to happen. I said it's just going to
happen. That's why Jesus, when he is at
the time of his greatest leadership, I mean, they're
beating him, pulling out his beard.
I mean, they put a crown of thorns.
They're saying stuff. He's not even talking, are
defending himself. They're railing against him and
he's like this. I mean, Herod, King Herod was
one of the worst, railed at him and Jesus was like, Jesus didn't
even give him the plan of salvation.
I don't even want to hear that, but that's fine.
Wouldn't even talk to him about how he could get right.
He was silent before the king the whole time.
Wow. Which means his fear of the Lord
prompted him not to. You know who I am now.
I'm going to tell you right now, if you find yourself having
these kinds of conversations, you need to stop and say, wait a
minute, I need to have the fear of the Lord.
That's why the Lord says vintage, says mine.
Thus saith the Lord. I will repay.
I'll repay. That's right.
I'll do it. I'd much rather have God defend
me than me defend me. Amen.
You know, and I may feel like I have a great defense, but you
understand when you're talking to the blind, I don't care how
great the defense is. All right, so the fear of the
Lord is also a fear of reverence, a care to please him
and aversion to A to offend him. Now that's a big deal because
you understand when you know Scripture, like I know a lot at
Anchor Faith Church knows, then you understand.
It's very important when you're underneath the spirit of the
fear of the Lord that you make sure your tone, your words, your
actions are not being offending him.
Now, how do you offend Him? By not doing what the Spirit is
telling you to do in the circumstance?
Because again, without faith, it's impossible to please Him.
He says you have a care to please Him, which means you have
a care to live by faith. And you cannot live by faith if
you're not first hearing His word, because faith comes by
hearing His Word. And if you're hearing His word,
then faith can come, but then you have to agree with it, be
submitted to it, be prompt to obey it.
OK, submit, yield to it. And as a result of that, then
you're not offending Him because you're doing it His way.
You're doing it his way. Hallelujah.
I've, I've been in multiple places.
And again, these are in multiple places throughout the world, OK,
where I've been talking in a particular situation, we have
the Holy Spirit. Everyone in the room is in
agreement. But when they leave the room,
not everybody follows the agreement of the Spirit.
At that point, I have to stay with what the Spirit said
because once I've done that, no matter what happens, I'm going
to stay with what the Spirit of the God of the Lord said.
Because if I'm doing that, then God will make His word come to
pass. But if I go to defense, if I go
against what he has declared for me to do after that meeting,
then you know what? I I run the risk of offending
the Lord, offending my father, and I do not want to do that.
Look what it says here in Proverbs 16 six.
It says, my loving kindness and truth.
Iniquity is atoned for and by the fear of the Lord. 1 Keeps
away from evil so #1 indicator If someone cannot seem to keep
themselves away from evil, they keep falling into it.
They're not yielding to the greater one on the inside of
them and who has come upon them and are exercising the fear of
the Lord, because the fear of the Lord will keep you away from
evil. That's powerful.
The fear of the Lord will keep you.
So again, another seducing spirit or doctrine of demon
that's in churches. I'm just a Sinner saved by
grace, you know, I mean, I sin just like you.
I mean, I sin every day. But I've asked God to save me.
His grace is upon me. That is not what God has said.
That is not from the Holy Spirit, because the fear of the
Lord will keep you, say keep it will keep you.
Grace has now empowered you to resist the temptation to sin so
that you now have risen above it and you're no longer subject or
yield to the law of sin and death.
Period. And if you find yourself
yielding to something you know is contrary to Scripture, you
need to say, Lord, teach me. Are you hearing me?
Teach me so that I can walk in the fear of the Lord.
Proverbs 2317 says, do not let your heart envy sinners.
You know how many believers are envious of those in the world?
And I wish I could do what they could do.
I wish I could. They're they're died, they're in
death. It's fake happiness.
It's not real joy or peace. Have you forgotten where you
came out of? He says.
But live in the fear of the Lord.
How often? Come on, how often, come on, how
often? So that means you cannot live in
the fear of the Lord from 10:30 AM to 12:30 or one whenever we
close today and that's it. You don't live in it in service,
You don't live in it only during you know, when you're around
people, right, all around other believers, you live it always.
It's always dictating your response.
Amen. So don't envy sinners shouldn't
envy them at all. And if anything, you should have
compassion for them, right? You're like, man, that's that's
just, this is tough. The life they're in, that's
horrible, man. And some of the the richest ones
that believers try to run after are the ones to be the most
pitied actually, because you said it's hard.
It's hard for a rich man who's put all this trust in his wealth
to get into the Kingdom. So when they got all those
yachts and they're flying and jet set now, you should be like,
oh Lord, I pray there be a way because I know for them it's
hard. But what do we do?
We want it. And we hear a spirit say, man,
get it. You'll be more effective for
God. Well, if that's your motivation
for getting it, you're already off because I'm pleasing to God
with what I already possess and as he adds to me, I'll just keep
doing what's already my character.
It doesn't show up after I get it.
Amen. Proverbs 22 four says this.
The reward of humility and the fear of the Lord are what are
they? Riches, honor, life.
This is less hilarious. So when one scripture, you're
like, don't be envious because if you're envying them, you're
not functioning in the fear of the Lord.
But if you're functioning in the fear of the Lord, Rick, because
if I need you on their yacht to take you around the world, I can
get you there. Oh, you don't want to.
I mean, God is not limited. This was so amazing and being
able to navigate resources, even the unrighteous resource to the
righteous. So again, the reward of humbling
yourself or saying Lord, not my will, your will be done and the
fear of the Lord, I want to I respect you, I honor you.
In no way do I want to do anything that's displeasing to
you. I only want to please you and I
want to be always an obedient to your word.
Never do I want to offend you because some of our offense to
God is through our actions with others.
I mean, I'll never forget this and it was you know, I was just
a babe in Christ, man, honestly, I was a babe in Christ, OK, I
was a baby in Christ. I had not mature.
I had very little information and revelation concerning.
I knew I was born again. I was filled with the Holy
Ghost, but I had no context of what I had none, you know, and I
had been raised in a denomination church was was just
get people saved, you know, So again, the this, this spirit of
the world talked to the church about you need to be relevant to
the world. The world doesn't understand
you. So you need to be relevant.
You know, you need to act like it, you know, because if you act
like them, you know, then you can kind of break down the
walls. You can share because again, it
is Jesus in your heart or not. I mean, this is how they
function. Now, I'm gonna give you a case
in point, right? I'm telling myself.
I used to dip tobacco. My dad smoked.
I did not smoke, But the same nicotine that was around my dad
showed up at me in another form. OK.
And that's when I was in high school, started it.
And then after I got out of school, well, I had a friend of
mine that was not living for God at all.
I had married my wife. We had dedicated our lives to
God. We were still in the Baptist
Church. Yeah, we were still in the
Baptist Church. I wouldn't fill with the Holy
Ghost, actually. So scratch that.
All I am is born again. So I'm like real infant here,
OK. And so I wanted to make an
impression on my friend. You know, I was trying to open
up the course of the code. We used to drink and do all
kinds of stuff at one time. And again, I was born again at
9:00. So I'm not living for God.
I'm living to, you know, American gospel people, not the
Bible gospel. And he was merciful and
long-suffering with me, OK. But I had quit, you know,
dipping all together because again, our life was different.
Well, I started picking it up again because he did.
So I go down to seeing where he worked and, you know, he
offered. And instead of act like I'm more
holy than him, Oh sure, 'cause you know I'm not going to go to
hell, 'cause I take a dip. I know this.
However, my unwillingness to just do the right lifestyle,
period, I was offending God because he didn't send me down
there to make so that he can think we look alike because if
we look alike, why does he need a change?
And today's modern American Christianity, they'll go to the
clubs with them, they'll go to the bars with them.
They'll do everything. And then, you know, oh, we're
not showing them a different life.
And I, we've got people here that were Alcoholics.
They were bound to alcohol. And the last thing they need is
a preacher to come drink one with them because that's called
confusing. It's like, well, you know,
basically all we're saying is our God is able to save us from
a place called hell, which is his anyway.
The hell is not the devil's. The devil doesn't own hell.
God because sin existed, because the devil was cast out, there
was a lake of fire destined for him that became a by product of
God's Kingdom called a prison system.
So God's in control of that place.
God's in control of the lake of fire because once you're in
there is no parole God will seek.
There is no such thing as a lake of fire break, a prison break.
Now they made for all eternity try to figure out how they can
get out, but it will be only a failed attempt because God has
that thing on lockdown. Hallelujah.
We really should sing that song instead of hell lost another
one, we say God pardon another one and I am free, right?
Because at the end of the day, you deserve to be there and God
can pardon you. From yourself, glory to God.
OK, my point is, is that that is offensive to God because even in
my immaturity, I had already made decision.
I should stop this. I mean, I mean, it created other
sin where I I go home and my wife doesn't even know.
And we'll get to that one. I didn't think.
Now she was born again and filled with a Holy Ghost.
So she had access to things I wasn't even operating in at the
time. So she was merciful to me too.
Amen. Thank you Jesus, so again the
reward of humility and the fear of the Lord are riches, honor
and life. Could it be that some of the
transfer of the wealth of the wicked is not coming to the
church quicker is because we really do not have the fear of
the Lord in our lives? How do you know a fear of the
Lord can manifest? Are you in church?
Every time the door opens I'm preaching because that is the
obedience of God's word. Do not forsake the assembling of
yourself together as is the habit of some and all the more
as you see the day drawing near you should this your number one
thought process is what can I do for his church that He's planted
me with? It's my number one priority and
everything else is just an outlay or a byproduct of this
existence. Period.
And we have confused ourselves again through wrong spirits.
Well, the pastor gets paid. That's his job.
This is not my job. There are criteria where the
Lord does say because of the assignment, you'll be able to
receive it from the the church itself.
But we all have a part to play and God's paying every one of
us, every one of us, every one of us, right?
But again, what's the Spirit say?
Well, that pastor not going to control me.
I don't control you anyway. I mean, that is the dumbest
thing should be the easiest thing for you to cast off.
Because if I was controlling you, I would come to your house,
I'd come to your house, I'd drag you out.
I'd have, I would be on your bank account.
I'd be on your bank account. I would be a joint account
holder. In fact, I might probably be
primary, and I will give you an allowance.
That way you then have what's leftover that you gave first to
the Lord. But again, to do that, your
heart's not in it. God doesn't do that.
He wants you to love Him with all your heart.
I'm not controlling you. I mean, if believers would just
stop and think, but there's a lot of spirits talking
religiously and the untrained and and the offended, let's put
it that way, receive it. All right, Let's go to the
Spirit of Wisdom. Spirit of Wisdom, y'all doing
all right, Amen. I don't want to stop.
I just want to drive on y'all, OK?
I mean, it's still young, but we have water baptism.
And I know that the Spirit of Wisdom, look what it says in
Proverbs 319, it says the Lord say the Lord by wisdom founded
the earth by understanding he established the heavens.
Can that's pretty amazing that Wisdom founded the earth.
I mean, we can. We still to this day have no
concept of all of the order and intricacies that are involved
with planet earth. Man is still dumbfounded by how
this thing does all that by wisdom, everything is in motion
and maintaining it's amazing. And by understanding the he
established the heavens. Look what it says in first
Corinthians 130. It says, but by his doing you
are in Christ who became to us wisdom from God and
righteousness and sanctification and redemption.
So Jesus is wisdom already. Now I'm going to give my plug
again because it's very important because again, in
American Christianity, we don't we don't think that knowing
Jesus other than I asked him to come into my heart and save me.
That's all we need to know. And that makes us, you know,
untouchable. All right, But it's in Christ by
because he is wisdom. If you are not in the word, then
you are not accessing wisdom. That's right, not wisdom that
comes from above because there is some things that happened
down in the earth that has knowledge about it.
But James, maybe we'll pick it up when I get over to knowledge
next week. It says it's it's earthly and
it's demonic. If you stay within the realm of
the natural and the spirit that does that you hear because
you're not connected to the Word, then all you know is
really demonic. But if you get over into the
word because in Christ, because he is wisdom, I said he is
wisdom. So you cannot even begin to
function with the Spirit of wisdom outside of the revelation
of of the Christ or His Word. Wisdom means this.
Wisdom consists in the choice of the best means to secure the
best ends. Wisdom consists in the choice of
the best means to secure the best ends.
You could say it this way. Wisdom is intellectual
clearness, Intellectual clearness, intellectual
clearness. Doctor Miles Monroe used to say
this. He said the greatest tragedy in
life is life without purpose, right?
He said the greatest challenge in life is knowing what to do,
and many believers do not have intellectual clearness.
The number one reason they don't is because they do not spend
time in the Word where wisdom is found.
First of all, it's opened up because of the fear of the Lord.
They don't even have the heart to just want to honor their
Father and be quick to obey Him and never to offend Him.
Which means the reason I'm in the Word is not so that I can
look smart. My motive is not so I look
smarter and more anointed than everyone else.
My motive, it comes from the fear of the Lord.
Father, I just want to know you. I just want to know you and I
want to be quick to obey you because your life, where am I
going to go? Your words are life.
The last thing I want to do is behave in a way that is
offensive to you or offends you. So show me your word.
Now when you go in there, guess what?
Wisdom begins to open up. Wisdom begins to open up.
And again, God knows your heart or the why you're doing what
you're doing. We're going to see that here in
a minute. So it's intellectual clearness.
It also means this. It means wisdom is the power of
discerning the nature of things through the appearance.
What I mean is there you're not discerning it based upon what
you see. You're discerning it beyond what
you see or, or you are. Yeah, you're discerning it
beyond what you see. You're able to to recognize us.
In essence, you can be in a situation, but yet you have
God's Word, and wisdom allows you to navigate in a way that's
contrary to what you see because you're already, you're through
it. In essence, this, it's this
salt. Yeah, though I walk through the
valley of the shadow of death. I'm in what looks like death,
but it's just a shadow, and I'm going to walk through it there.
In fact, He is a lamp into my feet and a light into my path,
Right. So in essence, I see things, but
yet I go to Him, and wisdom now opens up, which allows me to go
through the appearance of what I am, what I see, so that we can
accomplish God's ultimate will. Are you hearing me well in
Ephesians 117? And God wants you to have this.
Look what it says here, that the God of the Lord Jesus Christ,
the Father, glory may give to you a spirit of wisdom.
Wisdom. Now we'll be able to use this
again next week and the revelation of the knowledge of
Him concerning the spirit of knowledge.
But here God wants to give you a spirit of wisdom.
But again, the spirit of wisdom, it opens up because of the
spirit of the fear of the Lord. All right, so you got to make
sure your heart's right so that then you can have access to
wisdom that created the earth, founded the earth.
Amazing stuff. This is what's so amazing about
that statement. By wisdom He founded the earth,
which means anything you got going on in this planet wisdom,
which means if you get his, you can access it.
I mean, you start, things can happen.
It's amazing. Look what it says here in
Proverbs 3. How blessed are the man who
finds wisdom and the man who gains understanding for her
profit is better than silver and gold.
Thank you Jesus. And her her gain is better than
fine gold. She is more precious than jewel,
and nothing desire compares with her.
Long life is in her right hand. In her left hand are riches and
honor. Her ways are pleasant ways and
all her paths are peace. She is a tree of life to those
who take hold of her and happy are all who hold her.
Fast man, let's do the last one real quick and we'll close.
Psalms 119 verse 34 says Give me understanding that I may observe
your law and keep it with all my heart.
The only reason why the church has moved into the sways of the
world and their writings and the way they craft things today is
because number one, they have no value for the word of the king.
And here the psalmist says look and the Psalms 119 is an amazing
Psalms, OK, He said give me understanding that I'm and why
do I want understanding? Not so that I'm smarter than
everyone, so that I can tell people what to do.
No, so that I may observe your law, which is His word.
The word law is not immediately associated with Moses, although
there is connections there. But again, even the law of Moses
was perfect and blameless. It's just that our nature could
not keep it, but Jesus did. He fulfilled it.
Are you hearing me? It is to keep His word and to
keep it with all my heart. So I want to keep His word with
all my heart. Psalms 119 One O 4 says this.
From your precepts, I get understanding, which means,
again, if you're not in the Word, you're not receiving God's
understanding or the spirit of understanding is not speaking to
you. You cannot have this outside of
a continual constant relationship with the reading of
the Word. I'm not talking about you
listening to YouTube preachers. I'm talking about you Again, let
me give you the case in point. You cannot grow watching someone
else eat, wow, that steak looks good.
It's good man. And you know what?
You're not getting nourished and there's so many believers that
are watching everyone else and you're not getting nursed
because you're really not trying to break it down to assimilate,
studying it for yourself, making it your own.
You're just Hallelujah, praise the Lord.
Well, you know, I'm going to restaurant go, wow, that steak
smells good. Wow, look how beautiful that is.
I smell that. Oh, that smells good.
I can get all the aroma of all the food and leave hungry and
then I just, I can come in five times a day.
I can see I can live in the restaurant and watch every meal
that goes to every table and die because I'm unwilling to put it
in my own mouth and chew on it. All right, so let's get to where
we're chewing. Well, we are.
I mean, I you understand, he says your precepts from your
precept. I get understanding.
Therefore I hate, say, hate every false way.
You understand? As a believer, it's OK to hate
some things. You know, man, there's a bunch
of, you know, they hate. Yeah.
Yeah, we do. And that's love.
Love hates. Love can hate.
No problem. There's no issue there.
God has no problem with that. He wants you to hate some
things, and he definitely wants you to hate evil, wants you to
hate it. He don't want you to rub
shoulders with it. He don't want you to caress it.
He don't want you to take it to bed with you.
He wants you to hate it. All right.
So the definition of this is moral insight, OK?
It means the power of discerning the differences of things in
their appearance. Man, we're going to get touched
on this a little bit more. Judgement resulting from wisdom
by which we distinguish things or decide on their character.
So if you're not pulling wisdom in, then you won't have the
right judgement of the situation.
And you know what is an epidemic in the church today?
People thinking they know about something without knowing it at
all. They have no understanding of
the situation. But buddy, they are walking
around judging it and talking to people.
Except for the one who actually has the information.
All right? It also means this idea of a
sharp sense of smell. I love this one and I'm going to
tell you this particular commentary's name.
His name is Trap. Don't know his name other than
that, that's all that was left by another commentary.
But this is how this person framed understanding.
It's amazing sharpness of judgment in smelling out a
hypocrite. His sharp nose easily discerns
and is offended with the stinking breath of the
hypocrites. Hypocrites rotten lungs through
his word, though his words be never so scented and perfumed
with shows of holiness. In essence you got bad breath
bro. This is why God knows your heart
because your breath stinks it has no holiness in it.
Oh man, this is so good and let me tell you, when you start
functioning on the spirit of understanding, man it take you
to the thing about functioning on the spirit of understanding
is that it's going to give you access to things.
And I'm talking about though again, this is not happening if
you're not functioning under the fear of the Lord walking in
wisdom. It gives you the position of
understanding. If you're a haphazard Christian
doing it, you know, kind of on your terms, then anything you
think you've perceived you are wrong.
This is a pure line. It's a pure line.
Matthew 2218 says it this way. But Jesus perceived their malice
and said, why are you testing me, you hypocrites?
Right. Which means Jesus had the
ability through the Spirit of understanding of their motives.
OK, Don't, don't make me regret. Regret ending on understanding,
OK, OK, All right, this isn't trying to bring everybody down,
but this is sobering, OK? The thing is, is that nobody in
the room, including me, is fooling God.
It's not happening. And I think that's the biggest
thing that motivates me in the fear of the Lord is because I
know I am not fooling him, I'm not fooling him.
Mark chapter 2, verse 8. Immediately Jesus aware in his
spirit that they were reasoning that way within themselves.
He he said to them, why are you reasoning about these things in
your heart? He had the spirit of
understanding. So he's in a room again.
You know, we want unity and unity's powerful because when
the church is in unity, it's good for us.
It doesn't stop God. It's a lot of time.
Well, God can't do if we don't get unity.
God can move even if unity's not there.
He just needs one person in faith.
But it's better for us when we unify because we are actually
stronger and a better witness to the world because we kind of
hinder our witness when we're backbiters and we're not in
unity with one another, our unity to the word and unified
together. But God can function and still
perform where this unity is present.
And in this particular case, he's about, he's going to heal a
guy. He says your sins are forgiven
to when they rip the roof off and there's a group of Pharisees
with their rotten lungs that were reasoning who this is
blasphemy. Only God can forgive sin and he
says why are you reasoning in essence, he told them about
themselves yet in the corner they look like they the holy
bunch that they're more holy than anyone else in the room.
Hey man, so he calls them outlook at this Luke chapter 20
verses 21 to 23. They questioned him saying,
teacher, we know that you speak and teach correctly and you are
not partial to any, but teach the way of God and truth.
Is it lawful for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?
And he detected their trickery and said to them, So somebody
talking to you all nicey nice doesn't mean they're nicey nice.
This is the thing about the spirit of understanding, right?
Again, I have personally been in situations where someone has
come in, it's like, you know, your your word and you know, I
mean, I remember one particular place I went and say like, wow,
the anointing is in the room because I walked in the room.
I was at a house and I'm like, that's odd, right?
You know, my mind. I'm like, that's odd, but okay,
whatever. Well, it's because that person
had was out of a denominational church that didn't believe in
the baptism of the Holy Ghost or the gifts of the Spirit.
And they had discovered it and they were really excited and
wanted to talk with me because I was right.
Really, they were there to impress me.
You know, I didn't discern it initially, but I did discern
something necessarily right because it was a little over the
top. And who are the anointings here?
Right? OK, so apparently you discern
when I walk in the room. I had an anointing.
By the time we get done with the conversation, they said I was
preaching false doctrine, like, well, what am I?
Because you said something different when I walked in the
room, right? Well, it's because, again, they
didn't really believe in the baptism of Holy Spirit, whatever
is Speaking of tongues, only tongues through the gifts.
OK. And so when I started taking
them through Scripture, they wanted to take me through the
commentaries of their Bible. I said, I'm not.
You're believing this guy's interpretation of this.
Let's just stay with Scripture messing them up.
So at that point, I'm like, you know what?
Do you believe that Jesus died on the cross and rose from the
grave? Yep.
Do you believe if you ask him to be Lord, you be saved?
Yep. Then let's just stay at that.
So do I. I'm not having this
conversation, right, because I've discerned that you do not
have actual ears to hear. Right?
OK, had another person come in and talk about the, the worship
and the message and all this that and the other then only to
tell me their self-proclaimed prophet.
And, you know, they're going to start telling me what I need to
tell the congregation. And they're so humble.
They're going to stay in the back so that nobody knows them
because they come in late anyway.
And they leave early because God forbid that they act, you know,
put on all this holiness that they are and they got to stay
disconnected so they can hear from God because God forbid they
get around you. I mean, Jesus was only the
greatest prophet, but yet he was around people all the time.
It seemed like being around people didn't corrupt his
ability to be able to discern. So again, those are not from the
Spirit of God. So the minute they taught, I
said, I'm not doing that. You're not the Holy Ghost for
me. Pastor Angie was in that
meeting. So they're like, well, you know
what? I'll just come to worship and
leave. I said, well, if you're not
staying for the word that you said that the ministering of the
world was great and rightly divided, there's really no
reason for you to come. And they're like, are you
telling me I can't come to church?
I didn't say that what I said. And I had to repeat because
apparently they were hard of hearing.
And then they said, well, the Lord's released me from here.
I said, you're right. Now that is the Spirit of God.
He has released you from here because He never sent you except
for you to learn what He has taught us and to get you out of
your deception. But you like the voices you hear
more than you do the voice of God.
And this is the problem when people start picking up
deceiving spirits as they like the voices.
All right, Luke Chapter 9, verse 4648.
Got a couple more and then we'll move on.
He said an argument started among them as to which of them
might be the greatest. Jesus, knowing what they were
thinking in their heart, took a child and stood by his side and
said, whoever receives this child and my name receives me,
and whoever receives me, who sent me is the one who is least
among all of you. This is the one who is great.
So again, here's his own disciples having a challenge
about stuff and he has understanding.
He's discerned now it sounds good.
Who's going to be the greatest? Who's going to be?
But he's like, something ain't right.
With this conversation again, the Pharisees came to seem like,
oh, you're such a great teacher. We know you teach correctly.
You're just trying to trick me. You're just trying to get me to
say something so you can throw me.
I mean, you understand, I, I, I am probably you as well.
But I know I have had people come around only to try to get
me to mess up. Now, can I say this?
It is a really wrong place to be that when someone finds out
about you not doing right and you repent and get right, that
you all of a sudden take this thought.
You can't wait for the one that helped you to do wrong so you
can feel better about yourself. I say this every time in Vision
Partnership. I cannot tell you that people
won't talk about me. They talked about Jesus.
All I say is when they mention my name and things I'm doing and
I'm not there, would you please stop them and say, let's set a
meeting with Pastor Earl so he can be in the meeting to verify
what you're saying he did. Because I'll do it and have done
it because I hear stuff because I'm the pastor.
I hear some stuff by the Spirit. And those are the ones that I
don't try to address the quickest because they're the
most problematic. That's the Sarah moment.
She's laughing in the tent when Jesus says she's going to have a
baby next year. She comes out to give him some
food and he goes, why'd you laugh?
I didn't laugh. Now, if you were standing around
the tent as one of the helpers and Jesus said, no, you did
laugh. I didn't laugh.
Well, who you going to believe they could go in and say, Sarah,
I can't believe he called you a liar and said to you, I can't
believe that. Yeah, I mean, I I didn't laugh.
And then here she is selling a lie because we know Jesus is
right. Those are tough when you're
like, I know you're talking about me.
I know you're spreading rumors. No, I'm not.
Yeah, I know. Yeah, I do.
Those are hard. So, you know, I'm like, Lord,
you know, I'll do it if you tell me.
But I'd much rather have the smoking gun.
Well, smoking gun comes when they tell somebody else and then
someone tells me, and then I'm like, we'll set a meeting.
So and so said that you said. I mean, I've done this because,
again, the Bible says go to them in private.
Did this happen? No.
Well, I got the person who said it is right outside the door and
I'll bring them in right now because somebody is not honest.
Say Amen anyway, right. OK, discernment, Peter, discern
Simon the sorcerer. Man.
I want to pay some money to get that.
Your heart's not right, son. And he was like, and pray for me
that what you just said didn't happen because, again, he was a
babe in Christ. He just got born again.
He hadn't got rid of his sorcery ways completely in his mindset,
but his spirit man was born again.
Are you hearing me? We'll close with this one.
Luke Chapter 9, verses 51 to 55. Are you here?
Are you getting anything today? All right, I know we've gone
along, but hey, where else we going to go eat?
I mean, my wife had the record the other day.
I got to beat it again. I mean, that's how this works.
And Pastor Mike comes up and tries to beat mine.
Pastor Chase is probably going to try to beat us all because
he's younger. I'll be like, no, I'll come back
and get the title. I'm just kidding.
I mean, can we we can discern we you go to movies longer than
what I preach anyway. So, I mean, there's some that
I'm going to beat right now. OK.
When the days were approaching for his ascension, he was
determined to go to Jerusalem. And he sent messages on ahead
and they went and entered a village of the Samaritans to
make arrangement for him, but they did not receive him because
he was traveling towards Jerusalem.
When his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord,
do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and
consume them? Look what Jesus says.
But but he turned and what guys I really appreciate you love me
so much and I wish everybody that followed me had a heart
like you to want to defend me, care for me.
No, it's not what Jesus did. He rebuked them and said you do
not know what kind of spirit you are.
And this is James and John you, you ready for this.
There were three of the 12 that he spent more time with was on
the Mount of Transfiguration. And here's two of the three.
I mean they had access and yet they're still hearing the wrong
because here's the thing, the spirits only telling them
something that they know has occurred cause fire came down to
heaven with the prophet Elijah sure did.
And they were on the mountain when they saw him.
So just because you want to do a scripture that mean you're
hearing God in that this is really important.
So here's someone that's been around for a while, been
associated with Jesus in his inner circle, yet can get it
wrong. Are you hearing me?
So the spirit of understanding is really important because
here's the cool thing, because Jesus could discern those
situations, guess what? You have access to as well.
You do as well. And half the stuff going on in
the church would really not go on in the church.
If they had the fear of the Lord moved into the spirit of wisdom,
they would access the spirit of understanding.
And when someone started talking about someone and started doing
something, you'd be like, no, no, no, no, no.
Because typically what happens is a person comes to you and
just starts talking and then you give them the stiff arm,
spiritual stiff arm. I'm not listening to that.
So then they come back more crafty and they start to give
accolades about stuff or they start giving to you personally.
There's all kinds of ways to start working it if they're
going to have that kind of heart.
But you can discern every one of them, everyone.
This is why we are the least excused because we have access
to this kind of. I mean, you shouldn't be
delusional about ministers on YouTube.
Should be easy for you to say, yeah, I'm not going to listen
that that's not hooked up to the Spirit.
I am because I'm in the Word and they can't manipulate me.
At Anchor Faith Church, there's one thing you're going to get
here. It is a heavy diet of the Word.
It's going to happen because at the end of the day, I don't
control you. But God sure wants to lead you
and He definitely wants us to be in unity and brotherly love.
And that comes from knowing the Word and then wants us to be
very influential in our world. And that only comes from knowing
the will of the Father. Let me say it this way, God is
not a case law judge. He does not judge you based upon
your case. He has met the condition so that
everyone can take a pathway and it's all righteous, no
favoritism, none. He's paid the price and it's up
to you to follow his way. So you don't have a special case
with him. You have a corrected course by
him should you willfully want to follow.
Because he is just for all, for all.
Every tongue, every tribe, every nation, none or at a
disadvantage, and all are without excuse.
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