Sunday Sermon Re-cap- "Reach in"
Eze 36:26 NKJV - "I will give you a new
heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of
your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
As we Reach up & Reach out we must also let the Holy Spirit Reach in to our lives and transform more and more into the image of Christ.
For us to continually grow spiritually we must learn not to block God’s hand in our lives
The Gospel is the
good news. Jesus laid down his life for us to have a vibrant relationship with
God empowered by the Holy Spirit to be whole and holy.
We must learn to
empty our cups and allow God to pour into our lives.
In martial arts they say 'when the student is ready the teacher will appear'. We must ready our hearts for the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives.
Today I want to share
with you 3 big ideas regarding
letting God reach in to our lives
- 1) We must allow the Holy Spirit to reach in and awaken or revive our Spirit
When we accept Jesus
Christ as a our Lord and Savior the Holy Spirit awakens our spirit that was
formerly dead (hence the term born-again)
Now to many have
been serving God for sometime and we know there are times we get so acclimated to church
life that luke-warmness creeps into our hearts and we find ourselves with a spirit that needs
reviving hence the term and phenomena of revival.
The first step to revival is
recognition, then prayer and confession with a contrite heart that will increase our desire,
discipline and ability to delight ourselves in attending kingdom business of personal
devotion to God and commitment to build his kingdom.
2Ch 7:14 NKJV - "if
My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek
My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and
will forgive their sin and heal their land.
You have to be willing to 'prime the pump' of spiritual growth even when your not feeling inspired.
This will take Faith (belief in the person and process of the holy spirit), Faithfulness (mature consistency with expectation set on God’s time) and proper usage of emotion (inside energy in motion) we must use emotion and at the same time not be lead by them.
Emotions are a good servant or a wicked tyrant.
We need passion minus the drama
We need not just a spiritual desire but spiritual discipline. The combo of proper desire and discipline will bring delight to our spiritual lives.
2) We must let the Spirit of God come in our hearts to cleanse, extract and fill our hearts
Many people try to
fix themselves with many different modalities, Some are positive but we must understand that to truly grow as a
person that is a Christ-follower we must allow the Holy Spirit to not only
allow the process of internal cleansing/extracting of bad habits and
prevailing negative thought patterns we must also fill our hearts with a desire to be more like Christ.
If a person says they are going to not do (blank) any more and not think of (blank) anymore and does not fill in their heartsas well as their minds with Christ they may find themselves with a new and worse negative (blank).
There is a void in our inner being that is reserved for Christ only he can truly fit and fill that void anything else is a bootleg replacement that is not a natural fit and solution. Its just a temporary band-aid to an eternal issue.
We can not just stop
doing bad but start doing Godly good
The heart of man has
a vacuum-like nature to it. It has to be filled. If we "empty" our
heart with evil, without filling it with Jesus and His good, evil will rush in
again to fill it.
Luk 11:24 NKJV -
"When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places,
seeking rest; and finding none, he says, 'I will return to my house from which
I came.'
Luk 11:25 NKJV -
"And when he comes, he finds [it] swept and put in order.
Luk 11:26 NKJV -
"Then he goes and takes with [him] seven other spirits more wicked than
himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last [state] of that man is
worse than the first."
Let the Holy spirit Fill your life with a desire to Love God, Live for God and Lead others to do the same.
This is part of Victory Outreach's anointing to rescue people and to give them a desire to fill their life with
God’s mission, mandate and mantle.
We cannot fear the calling of God in our lives and try to
ignore and replace it.
As we let God fill us we will develop a compassion to reach the lost.
3) We must let the Holy Spirit heal the scar tissues of our hearts
Sometimes when we were young we had a Boo-Boo and we love to talk about it but we didn't let anyone get near it.
We must let the holy
spirit and God’s word penetrate every chamber of heart.
We must be willing to present our hurts and pains in the presence of God and ask for his divine touch.
2 stories from the
Gospels come to mind
Luk 13:10 NKJV - Now He was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath.
Luk 13:11 NKJV - And
behold, there was a woman who had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years, and was
bent over and could in no way raise [herself] up.
(The WOMAN WAS
RESTRICTED)
Luk 13:12 NKJV - But
when Jesus saw her, He called [her] to [Him] and said to her, "Woman, you
are loosed from your infirmity."
Luk 13:13 NKJV - And
He laid [His] hands on her, and immediately she was made straight, and
glorified God.
(THE WOMAN WAS RELEASED)
Luk 13:14 NKJV - But
the ruler of the synagogue answered with indignation, because Jesus had healed
on the Sabbath; and he said to the crowd, "There are six days on which men
ought to work; therefore come and be healed on them, and not on the Sabbath
day." (THE RULER WAS RESENTFUL)
Luk 13:15 NKJV - The
Lord then answered him and said, "Hypocrite! Does not each one of you on
the Sabbath loose his ox or donkey from the stall, and lead [it] away to water
it?
Luk 13:16 NKJV -
"So ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has
bound--think of it--for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the
Sabbath?"
(THE RULER GOT REBUKED)
Luk 13:17 NKJV - And
when He said these things, all His adversaries were put to shame; and all the
multitude rejoiced for all the glorious things that were done by Him…… (THE CROWD WAS RESPONSIVE)
Mat 12:9 NKJV - Now when He had departed from
there, He went into their synagogue.
Mat 12:10 NKJV - And behold, there was a man who had
a withered hand. And they asked Him, saying, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?"--that
they might accuse Him.
Mat 12:11 NKJV - Then He said to them, "What
man is there among you who has one sheep, and if it falls into a pit on the
Sabbath, will not lay hold of it and lift [it] out?
Mat 12:12 NKJV - "Of how much more value then
is a man than a sheep? Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath."
Mat 12:13 NKJV - Then He said to the man,
"Stretch out your hand." And he stretched [it] out, and it was
restored as whole as the other.
Mat 12:14 NKJV - Then the Pharisees went out and
plotted against Him, how they might destroy Him.
Mat 12:15 NKJV - But when Jesus knew [it], He
withdrew from there. And great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all.
When we come to church whether we have something crooked or withered in our lives we must come willing to stretch ourselves in the spirit and let God’s healing presence make us whole. You may not get cured in one service but we can allow God to begin the process of healing in our lives.
I pray this week you will allow the Holy Spirit to reach into your life and make you whole, Holy and Hungry to be more like Christ.
Always remember God is more concerned with your character than your comfort and more concerned about your holiness than your happiness.
Peace,
Pastor Ed
Victory Outreach North Brooklyn meets every Sunday @ 108 Manhattan ave (Beween Boerum ave & Johnson ave). We are near the L train Montrose stop, the G train Flushing stop and the J train @ flushing ave . Service starts at 11am (service is approx 90 minutes long) Some people wear suits and some people come in jeans, what really matters is that you are there ready to discover (or re-discover) the difference Jesus makes. www.vonorthbrooklyn.org
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