Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:08] Speaker B: Good afternoon.
My name's Pastor Peter. This is my wife, Sherry. We are co founders of Eyes to See Ministries International.
You're going to hear a scripture today that is the foundational scripture for the, the conception of the ministry that was given to us by, by the spirit of God.
And we're going to talk about that. We've been in a teaching series on end times prophecy and the seven letters Jesus, seven letters to the seven churches in Revelation.
What I find interesting is week after week there is some other information to be added in. But because we're talking about the church in general, Jesus Christ specifically, and his letters to the churches, they're applicable today. So you can go through the Bible and any message could be added into what we've been in now.
But there is a topic that is weighing so heavy on my heart that I need to talk about it tonight.
And we began with the, the, we closed last week with the two churches, the contrasting churches, Smyrna.
[00:01:37] Speaker A: Smyrna.
[00:01:37] Speaker B: Smyrna and Laodicea.
And I want to get to those scriptures later in this teaching. But I, I really need to talk about what I'm going to talk about now and as a general topic, and this isn't the title for the message, but it would be Unity in the Church.
Now, we looked at, we looked at the definition of church from the concordance last week, and I'm going to repeat that today.
But there's some, there's some things I, I can't say dynamically happening within the body of Christ because it's static and, and because we are in the end times, we're in the last days of perilous times.
The church as a whole has to get over the traditional things that they're doing right now and understand some things. And I'm going to use an example, a broad example of something that happened somewhat recently to myself and Sherry, as general as I can, because I'm not pointing fingers, it's just an example.
But the reason I repeated by the Spirit is because the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth and he's in us, and we should learn how to be led and guided by him. That's what his job is.
And there are many different ways denoted, recorded in the Holy Bible on how God speaks to us.
And when you learn those and you develop the relationship, a personal relationship with God, you can actually learn in prayer.
When you hear a word, I could be sitting there and think to myself, that was Jesus that just said that, or that's the Holy Spirit leading me, or the Father just said that to me.
Your relationship has to be that real for you. And unfortunately, in my travels, I'm finding that this seems to be received like some kind of mysticism, like the Bible. Yeah, I know there's stories in there, but they. People look at you like a deer in headlights. Excuse me. When you're talking about hearing from God.
And that doesn't always mean you're going to have an audible voice of God. You hear the audible voice of God. I mean, I've only had that happen, I think, once.
But I want to focus. I want you to remember Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of holiness, the Spirit of truth.
So we're going to look at a couple scriptures before I go back through Strong's concordance and that definition, because this is very important for the church.
So in the book of Acts, Paul is with Barnabas and they sail away from Philippi and Miletus.
And from Miletus he sends to Ephesus for the elders of the church.
And then in Acts, chapter 20, this is the next, I call them, sectional headings. The next sectional heading for verses 17 through 27, I call this Paul called the Ephesian elders of the church.
And then the next set of Scriptures, verses 28 to 38, and verse 38 concludes chapter 20, is Paul's exhortation to guard the church. So he's going to speak to the elders of the church in verses 17 to 27, and then he's going to tell them why this is important.
Now, in Acts 20, 28, and I may repeat this, you need to hear this.
This is Paul speaking. And I'm going to give you the verse from the amplified version.
Now, I've gone back because I know certain people get.
I don't want to say hung up, but people are used to using a certain version of the Bible.
If you listen and write down this verse from the amplified, you can go into the new King James Version and you can go into the English Standard Version. And you're going to see this Scripture as it is with the amplified section added into it. So this is not deviating from what most people are already used to hearing.
So verse 28, listen carefully. This is Paul speaking.
Take care and be on guard for yourselves and for the whole flock.
The whole flock over which the Holy Spirit has appointed you as overseers to shepherd, tend, feed, guide the church of God, which he bought with his own blood.
I'm going to repeat it. If you wrote it down, I want you to underline the whole flock, the Holy Spirit and The church of God.
Take care and be on guard.
Be on guard for yourselves and for the whole flock over which the Holy Spirit has appointed you as overseers.
Their position's been appointed by the Holy Spirit.
Everybody that's in ministry should be appointed by the Holy Spirit for what they're doing to shepherd, to tend, to feed, to guide the church of God.
Now, whose church is it? It's the church of God which he bought with his own blood. Now remember the church of God, because you're going to hear it soon when I get back into the concordance.
In the English Standard Version, it says, pay careful attention to yourselves and to the flock in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers to care for the church of God.
And then in their footnotes it says, some manuscripts say, of the Lord, the church of the Lord, which he obtained with his own blood.
Now if we back up to Acts, chapter 13.
This is Paul and Barnabas. They're on Cyprus, verses one through three, Verse 2 from the Amplified chapter 13 in the book of Acts, verse 2.
Now, this book, in a lot of versions, says the Acts of the disciples.
I like to call it the Acts of the Holy Spirit. And that's what we should be.
That's how our mindset should be.
So chapter 13, verse 2.
Remember, this is Paul and Barnabas. While they were serving the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, the Holy Spirit said, set apart for me, Barnabas and Saul, for the work to which I have called them.
Remember Acts 20:28. Take care and be on guard for yourselves and for the whole flock over which the Holy Spirit has appointed you.
While they were serving the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, set apart for me the Barnabas and Saul or Paul for the work to which I have called them. Now, in my notes, I have that highlighted, bold and underlined for the work to which I called them.
And then while Paul is preaching on Cyprus, through verses 4 through 12 and chapter 13, in verse 4, it is written, so they being sent forth by the Holy Spirit, over which the Holy Spirit has appointed you, set apart for me Barnabas and Saul.
And they were being sent by the Holy Spirit. So this is very important.
Remember the. The general topic is church unity. Whose church is it? It's Jesus church. And who should be the driving force, the inspiration, the spirit of truth within the church? The Holy Spirit. Not man, not us,
[00:11:41] Speaker A: not Eldritch.
[00:11:45] Speaker B: Why would. Why would you say that? Pastor Peter? Well, let's go back to the book of Proverbs, the book of wisdom.
Proverbs 16:2.
All the ways of a man are clean and innocent in his own eyes.
And he may see nothing wrong with his actions. You could say his thoughts, his words, his deeds.
But the Lord, capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D, weighs and examines the motives and intents of the heart and knows the truth.
There's a lot of words we just saw in Scriptures.
Motives, intents of the heart. And he knows the truth.
Proverbs 21, verse 2.
Every man's way is right in his own eyes. But the Lord weighs and examines the hearts of people and their motives.
So I could do something.
I could do a deed.
I could be full of good deeds.
And I could be the church of Ephesus.
I could be busy.
And yet I left my first love. We're going to get back to that book before we close. In that first two chapters of Revelation, God weighs and examines our motives and our intents that are in our heart.
Now, what could possibly make my heart, my motives and my intents different from a holy God who is the Spirit of truth and who cannot lie? And we'll see these scriptures again.
Jeremiah 17:9. The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is extremely sick.
Who can understand it fully and know its secret motives?
God can.
Whether we understand what our motives or intents are when we start out or not, God knows in our heart what it is.
The greatest miracle and I've seen, and so has Sherry.
I would not be exaggerating to say well over 100 creative miracles by God. The greatest miracle that I've seen is a changed heart because of these Scriptures.
That's why if you are a disciple of. If you're a believer of Jesus Christ and you've gone beyond that and now you've decided, I want to be a disciple. I want to. I want to do exactly what he does. I want to. Whatever he tells me to do, I'm going to do. That's a disciple learning from the teacher. The only way you're going to do that is through a transformed heart, away from yourself.
And then Proverbs 3, verse 5. Trust in the Lord with all your heart. That wicked, sick thing has to trust God. Here is the flesh versus the Spirit in a nutshell that Paul's wrestling with in Galatians, Chapter 5 and throughout the book of Romans.
And we're going to get into that at some point as a teaching.
What does it mean to be in the Spirit and walk in the Spirit? Because they're two different things.
And we're going to talk about sanctification, salvation and sanctification. Because there's an immediate sanctification that happens at salvation, and then there's the progressive sanctification. And that's what people forget when. When they're trying to say certain things and doctrines about salvation. If you don't understand this progressive sanctification, that doctrine, you're gonna be lost.
And if you don't understand the Holy Spirit, who the driving factor is that's gonna help you defeat your flesh, the world, and the devil.
You have to be submitted to the Holy Spirit. That's the only way this is going to work. You cannot do it on your own. That's why Paul said, I do what I don't want to do and I don't do what I know I should do.
If you're trying to do this on your own, and I don't care what it is, it could be fasting. Whatever it is, if you've turned away from trusting God and look at yourself to try to overcome something, you're gonna fall. And that's why. That's what happened to the Church of Ephesus. That's what happens to new converts when they get shot out of the gate. They're on fire for God. And then all of a sudden, they start getting attacked. The world's coming on them, the devil's coming against them. People in the church are criticizing them, and all of a sudden they're not taught how to deal with that.
And unfortunately, I wish somebody would have taught me a long time before, but.
But it's the. It's the Holy Spirit.
Now, why am I saying all this?
It's Christ's church, and we're talking about unity. And what. What can that really mean?
So if we go back to the lexical summary that the word for church is ecclesia. Remember, that's church, assembly, congregation, the community of the redeemed of Christ, whether being on earth or in heaven, or both.
Used only of people.
Not a location, it's not a structure.
The people of Christ. The redeemed of Christ used only of the redeemed, not of the unredeemed that are in their midst.
So that means I'm part of. I'm the church.
Sherry's the church. Sean is the church.
Collectively, wherever we go, that assembly is the church of Jesus Christ. And then there's the universal church, which is all of us throughout the world.
And whose church is it?
It's Jesus Church, bought by his blood for his purposes.
Now, I.
You know, I love to do research. I'm a student of the Bible and I want to reinforce what I just said.
So church.
That word is found in 79 verses, 80 times. So there's one verse where, where it's used twice, all in the New Testament.
Now I went and broke this down from the Gospel of Matthew, Acts, Paul to the Romans, Paul to the Corinthians, First Corinthians, two Corinthians to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, where that word shows up to Timothy, to Titus, to Philemon, Philemon to Hebrews, the Epistle of James, Peter, John and Revelation of Jesus Christ. I went through every one of those books in the Bible 80 times. That word shows up church.
48 times out of 80 it says the church.
It doesn't have a denominational name. It says the church the rest of the times.
And I'll give you the phrases without the breakdowns for time sakes. The other times other than the 48, so there's 32 other references. It says all the church, every church, the whole church.
The church of God, a glorious church, the body comma, the church or the body of Christ, the church, the church of the living God, and then the general assembly and church of the firstborn.
Wow, who's that? Jesus Christ, the word church.
So we have, we are the church.
We saw several verses where it was the Holy Spirit that said to that assembly of people, you people separate me, Barnabas and Saul for the work that I have called them to do.
So it doesn't sound like I have to go to some kind of a board meeting and get, have a vote about what decisions need to be made in Jesus's church.
And unfortunately in my travels, I'm finding out where many people don't know how to be led by the Holy Spirit with these things.
And I, I hope that's more the case than that. People, man whose ways think they're good and they're doing right, but what is their intent? Which Jesus knows. And he's the head of the church. He's the cornerstone, chief cornerstone. The firstborn.
Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. When Peter preached at Pentecost, he preached the word of God and the Holy Spirit. Convicted people and 3,000 came to the church that day.
You want your church to grow, Be led by the Holy Spirit. Get the messages for the congregation from the Holy Spirit and preach that and the Holy Spirit will come upon you and hearts will be pricked. And the thing that I said earlier, the greatest miracle that you can See, you'll see right visibly in front of your eyes.
Excuse me.
If I'm preaching and I'm looking out over the whole congregation and I start to see a couple people weeping, that is the Holy Spirit convicting them through that message. Those people needed to hear that more than likely. We all did. But those people are the ones being affected. That is not what I would call a move of the spirit.
A move of the spirit. If you want to know what that would look like, go to 1 Kings and 2 Chronicles and see what Solomon prayed when the glory of God came. That's a move of the Spirit. The glory of God. When people are down on their face and they're weeping and the presence of God is so thick you could cut it with a knife. And I've had that happen to me where I can't get up and I'm hours.
[00:24:55] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:24:56] Speaker B: They turn the lights off in the church. They locked the door. They covered me up with a blanket.
That's the move of God. That's God's glory. These are two different things.
And if you want to experience that, you go back and read in 1st Kings and 2 Chronicles, the sacrifice. Now, this is the Old Testament, what they did for that glory to come. Because your sacrifice today has to be a praise sacrifice and it has to be a worship sacrifice to give your heart to Jesus Christ.
Follow him and the word of God, The whole counsel of God, and don't hold back.
If you asked God, and I'm talking about we. I'm an itinerant pastor, ordained minister.
I don't pastor a church. I equip churches.
And that's one of the reasons we're having this discussion tonight. Because the church doesn't want to be edified and equipped.
It knows better.
Why would I say that?
All the ways of a man are clean and innocent in his own ways, in his own eyes. And he may see nothing wrong with his actions. But the Lord weighs and examines the motives and intents of the heart and knows the truth.
Ephesus, that church got so busy was looked like the model church and was concerned the model church. But they left their first love.
They got stuck in traditions and works. And we are called to do works. We should show good works out of love. And the driving force should be our love for Christ. And our zeal, our passion for Jesus should drive us to naturally. Like a knee jerk. You know, when I was in school, the doctor would take this little metal hammer and hit you on your knee to check your reflex.
We should have a knee jerk Reaction to do good things.
Our motive and the intents need to be good.
Now, I'm going to give you a couple biblical truths, foundational truths.
God cannot lie.
Now, I read an article today from AW Tozer that ties into some of these scriptures. And the question he was asking the church was, how sure are you that the Bible is true?
So I want to give you these 34 Scriptures. Numbers 23, 23 19.
God is not a man that he should lie, nor a son of man that he should repent.
Has he said and will he not do, or has he spoken and will he not make it good? It's an Old Testament Scripture.
Titus 1:2. In hope of eternal life of God who cannot lie, promised before time began.
Hebrews 6:18.
That by two immutable things, that means unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us.
2 Timothy 2:13. If we are faithless, he remains faithful. He cannot deny himself.
The Word of God.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word was made flesh.
2nd Timothy 3:16.
All scripture that I just read to you that you were just given is given by inspiration of God and is profitable or beneficial for doctrine, for reproof or for correction. For reproof or correction and for instruction, training or discipline. In what? In righteousness.
The Word of God in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Your Bible should have the Word, Word, capital W.
Isaiah 48, 8. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our Lord stands forever.
Jesus Christ is the Word. He's the way, the truth and the life.
And he's the same yesterday, today, and forever.
So if you hear somebody say on social media, you know, I think God's done with the Jewish people, we shouldn't look at them anymore. You don't need to bless them. That scripture doesn't apply anymore. Well, this says differently.
Or there's a whole.
I'm going to say there's a whole sectarian movement right now in the church that wants to take out the epistles of Paul.
They're not applicable today.
And I use that word sectarianism for a reason, by intent. The intent of my heart was to say that because it's a synonym for the word denomination.
Now, I'm not speaking tonight to criticize people, but I'm telling you that we are on a timeline, and I don't know if anybody else can feel it, but time seems to be moving faster.
We are heading rapidly down a timeline, a biblical timeline where some pretty bad things are going to happen.
We talked about one of them. God's going to pour out his wrath.
That's why we talked about this catching up.
And at some point I'm going to give you some Old Testament scriptures that use that phrase and I'm going to give you three early church fathers that when you go back and look at their writings, they are teaching and preaching on the catching up of the church. Jesus being what Paul says in second Thessalonians, in the first century, the second century, the third century, they were teaching on this. So this is not. I can't remember the name of the person, but the people that don't believe in the catching up of the church, they, they like to pin it on one person.
And, and I don't remember because I don't like to dwell on this kind of stuff. When they said this first came about, no, this was from the beginning. And if you look at what Paul says in second Thessalonians and go back and look at what the angels say when Jesus goes up in the clouds in the book of Acts and, and they're, they're looking at him and the angels say the same Jesus that came down is going to leave the same way.
You go back and look at that.
And there's scriptures in the Old Testament that will mirror that.
The Word of God will. God cannot lie. So the Word of God should.
You need the Word of God to compare the Word of God. The Word of God will confirm itself.
First Peter 1:25.
But the spoken word of the Lord endures forever. That's a footnote. It says, the Word of the Lord endures forever. Now this is the Word which by the Gospel was preached to you.
So all of this came about from my early study this week in First Peter. And I saw this Scripture and then everything else just flowed from it.
Matthew 24:35. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will by no means pass away.
Psalm 119:89. Forever, O Lord, your Word is settled. That means stands firm in heaven.
And John 1:14. And the word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we beheld his glory, the glory of the Word of God as the only begotten Son, full of grace and truth. You want to know where your grace is and your truth comes from the Word of God, Jesus.
Now I'm going to just say this.
The condition of the Modern Christian church is sectarianism and denominationalism.
And I'm not saying that, that if you're in a church that's a denomination, that I'm not criticizing you. I'm telling you where the modern church is today, where it came from historically and what it is today.
So I would go back and my questions are, are we spiritual people or are we carnal people?
We're not being led by the Spirit.
We're not exhibiting the fruit of the Spirit. First of all, we're not being spiritual people.
That's how we glorify God.
But Jesus also said, my family, my family are those that hear my words and do them.
So are we spiritual people or are all of our ways clean and innocent in our own eyes?
And we see nothing wrong with the decisions we make, the actions we take against others and our administration and management of the church. The Church of Jesus Christ, bought by his blood, Eyes to See Ministries International is a non denomination nonprofit Christian organization inspired by the Spirit of God to fulfill the Great Commission and edify and equip the church through the ministry, leadership gifts as well as other assignments and tasks as needed.
That's what this ministry is.
It's not assigned to a specific church so that we can take the gifts that we were given by Jesus Christ that the Holy Spirit chooses as the Spirit wills to use through us, which he has used out of the nine gifts of the Holy Spirit, at least for me, partially all of them, except for speaking in different tongues and interpretation. I got an interpretation one time, so I wouldn't say that was. That's irregular. But the other gifts, and it's the same thing with my wife Sherry, so we can teach on these things as part of the whole counsel of God.
Now the other gifts given to the church, the church, the whole church, every church whose church, Jesus Church bought by his blood for his purposes, is also found in Ephesians, the gifts given by Christ to the church.
And some were given apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers. That's Christ's gifts from himself to his own church, to edify and equip the church. That's exactly what this ministry does.
Now why do I harp on that? It's not to promote Eyes to Sea ministries. It's to go back and look at the condition that the modern church has found itself in.
Sectarianism is carnal.
And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual people, but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ, I fed you with milk and not with solid food.
For until now you were not able to receive it. That's where the church is today. It's not able to receive what I'm talking about tonight. It refuses to do this.
For where there are envy, strife and highlight. This is from First Corinthians, chapter 3, verse 1.
Highlight this phrase and divisions among you.
Are you not carnal and behaving like mere men?
All the ways of a man are clean and innocent in his own eyes.
And he may see nothing wrong with his actions. But the Lord weighs and examines the motives and intents of the heart and knows the truth.
For when one says, I am of Paul and another, I am of Apollos and another, I am of Cephas, are you not carnal?
You're not being spiritual people, you're being carnal.
The reason why most churches will not let Eyes to See ministries come in and help the church through the gifts Jesus gave to his own church, which is the church that said, no, we don't want you here.
They're being carnal. The Bible says, you're being carnal, you're being fleshly. You're not a spiritual people.
Now the argument is if you just join our group and put your name on a church register, then we can have. We then can have you. So what is that person saying?
We're not going to listen to Jesus.
It ain't his church anymore. It's our church.
And we voted on this and we put it in a paper document called the Constitution and bylaws. And our bylaws say that we're going to override what Jesus gave to the church as gifts and what the Holy Spirit, remember that word, that phrase, the spirit of truth, how he chooses to use people.
So I can assure you that.
It was the Holy Spirit that said to Peter Yanada and Sherry Yanada, separate yourselves and go to this place, this church. That's where I want you.
And it was that place that would not receive that. It couldn't receive it.
So I.
I know this message is going to be hard.
It's the word of God and I'm using the terms given by the Holy Spirit. That's carnal thinking.
It's thinking.
Man made thinking, human thinking, not the Spirit.
Now, I have just enough time to finish this because I actually looked. It was 4:07.
So I have nine minutes plus seven.
[00:43:34] Speaker A: I have a few things to say. I said, I certainly have a few things to say.
[00:43:38] Speaker B: Well, I'm gonna let you.
That's why I asked you earlier when you said I might have to leave. And I said, you sure you don't want to hang around a little bit? You might have something to say.
So the unity of the Spirit is written in the Bible, recorded in the Bible, all scriptures given by inspiration of God, the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 4:1 6.
The unity of the Spirit, the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth.
And I'm just going to highlight a couple phrases in these six to get to where I want to go to keep the unity.
There is one body, one body of Christ.
That means and one Spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all, and in you all.
And part of that is the Spirit of truth.
God knows your intents.
So what does that mean in verse 3? To keep the unity, the unity of the Spirit cannot be created by any human being. That's what you see today.
That's what I see in my travels. Unity attempted in the church by carnal thinking, carnal methods from human beings not being led by the Holy Spirit. And I can tell you this. Just because you were at a meeting, and I don't care how many people there were there, and they were all in agreement, does not mean they were being led by the Holy Spirit.
Most of the time in my walk and even before I committed my life to Christ, there were times in my life when I came to a crossroads and I heard a voice tell me, when everybody goes that way, you go the other way.
And I had to do that.
So if you became. And here's the crux of this. If you truly are a disciple of Christ and you truly can answer that question. Yes. What A.W. tozer said that you believe what this book says, my question is, is, are you walking in this?
It already exists. Now, I don't have time to doctrinally get into this, but the unity of the Spirit already exists for those who have believed the truth and received Christ. As the apostle proclaimed in chapters one and three, the Ephesians are now to keep that unity, not through human efforts or organizations, but by living worthy of the calling for which you, the saints at Ephesus, and faithful in Christ Jesus. Notice. Faithful in Christ Jesus were called.
Spiritual unity is maintained by being loyal to the truth and by keeping in step with the Spirit of God, being led and guided by the Spirit of God, being a spiritual people, a peculiar people, a holy priesthood, not a carnal people.
So if we're not doing this, according to the Bible, you're not ready to receive meat from the word of God.
You're still receiving milk.
Now, do not go to First Peter and look at the scripture that says you need to desire the sincere milk of the word of God, because that's a different context. You need to desire this like you are a baby that wants that milk.
So now let's look at verses 7 through 11.
This is what is referred to as the ministry leadership gifts.
Christ's gifts for the church.
Christ's church bought by his blood.
But to each one of us, grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. These are Christ's gifts.
And in verse 11, and he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers.
My job in the body of Christ, I am a called pastor.
That is what God did. You know Paul wrote I, Paul, a servant of God, an apostle called by Jesus Christ. I'm a called pastor by Jesus Christ. When I get sent into the mission field, I'm sent by Jesus. He tells me to go, where to go. And then I'm led by the Holy Spirit.
So what are the purpose of the leadership gifts? And again, this is me.
Christ's gifts for the church.
Christ's church in Ephesians 4:12,12,16. For the equipping of the saints, the. For the work of the ministry, for the edifying or building up of the body of Christ in verse 14, that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting.
In Matthew chapter 25, we have the Olivet discourse. I went through that earlier. In these podcasts, everybody focuses on the end times. Wars, rumors of wars, increased weather patterns, hearts will become cold. There's lots of different phrases, but you need to look at where that.
What that discourse is is Jesus answering the question that he's asked.
They come out of the temple and they're enamored by the beauty of the temple, the physical beauty of it. And Jesus tells them every one of these stones are going to be tossed down.
And he talks a little bit about the end times. And then the question is, when are these things going to happen and what are the signs?
And the very first thing Jesus says is, take heed, don't be deceived. That's the first part of his speech.
And yet that's the part everybody leaves out. Whoa, there's wars. There's rumors of wars. Yes, and there's a great falling away. We're in that right now. People are falling out of what? They're falling out of the faith.
It's a spirit of unbelief.
Unbelief is a sin.
Why don't we hear that right now?
[00:51:34] Speaker A: It's also a spirit.
[00:51:36] Speaker B: Deceitful, plotting.
But speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into him, into Christ, who is the head of the church. It's his church. The church, every church, all church.
The church of God, from whom the whole body joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.
So if somebody was told, I go back, separate me, Barnabas and Saul for the work that I have called them to do. The Holy Spirit sent somebody somewhere to do something. And that group of people decided on their own that they're not going to do that.
Who is carnal and who is spiritual? Now, that doesn't mean the spiritual person failed. They went and did what they were told to do.
And more than likely, in my case, my personal walk with God, he puts me in these situations. Now, he knew before that he knows beforehand what's going to happen.
He sent me to go back and bring correction to people.
Now if they don't receive that, that's their issue, just like forgiveness.
So that's where the modern church is right now.
The definition of a church is people, not a building. And yet the Body of Christ has been conditioned to lock itself in those four walls. And, and now they're going to create their own rules and regulations and they're not going to go do the Great Commission. Maybe they'll do a couple things here and there.
So when the world looks at the church doesn't see anything different than its world. How can you witness if you don't look different?
Are we being light?
Well, yes. That little cluster of assembly of people in those four walls, in their own minds, is looking light.
Well, who are they looking light to? Maybe themselves.
So we need to be led by the Spirit of God.
You will see a movement soon that's already happening.
There's people that are hungry.
They're desiring that sincere milk of the word that Peter talks about in one Peter.
And they're not getting it where they're at.
So they're out there seeking. Where else can I go?
The Bible tells us we're to assemble even more so in these last days. So I will listen to sermons on TV until I come across another one where I can go.
And then the Holy Spirit leads me to go There. But I wanted to go to a church I attended Sunday a month ago. And the Holy Spirit kept saying, not yet, not yet, not yet, not yet.
So I went and I, in my own mind, in my own ways, thought something different.
And I was supposed to be at that service because the service was what I needed to hear. I needed to get refreshed by the word of God. And now I can go spread that word.
So I can tell you that if you're in Adams or York county, there's a church called Redemption Church, 95 Pumping Station Road, Hanover, Pennsylvania.
I would. That's a church to go to. You'll hear the whole counsel of God.
Now, I'd be surprised if I went back and I didn't hear something similar to what I just did, because somebody told me about that church, somebody that over time, I've come to trust.
So I go and I go there and there's a confirmation. I have a witness. Now, now, really quick, because I want to let my wife speak.
She has some things to say. I looked up the history of the church, and my research question was, when did church. When did the church of Jesus Christ, bought by his blood for his purposes, first decide that they were going to take a church registry? And if they did that, why did they do that?
Well, guess why the early church did it, the one that was spiritual, because they wanted to keep track of the true widows and orphans.
Remember, and this is important, the apostles, in the book of Acts, there were deacons chosen.
What was the instruction given by those apostles to the ecclesia?
You go find. You go find seven people full of the Spirit.
They delegated that to the church.
So there. There must have been.
Why would that be? Well, obviously the church was operating under the spirit of God or the true church at the time.
I don't have time to get into it, but real quick, I'm going to say this. There's three parts to this. One is the institutional turn of the church.
The second one is the theological turn.
And the third major event that caused this phenomenon to occur is the political event.
So remember that denominationalism is no more by definition than more than one church coming together under a common belief.
And they created a governmental system of discipline and other things.
So it's not a boogeyman term, but when you throw humanality in there and you throw carnality in there and people not operating by the spirit of God, now it becomes what it's not supposed to be. Now it becomes the bad term that's out there today. And I can tell you this. If different groups of people don't get with other groups of people in the body of Christ, soon you're going to be in a world of hurt because you are being denied gifts given to the church by Jesus Christ by your own organization.
And if you are one of those gifts, taking up a pew in that church and you can't operate, you're going to spiritually start to wither some.
[00:59:23] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:59:24] Speaker B: And you're going to have to leave. But you got to go when the Holy Spirit. You got to come and go with the Holy Spirit.
And I'll let my wife Sherry have the floor here.
I'll give her 10 seconds. I think we have.
[00:59:41] Speaker A: You're so generous.
[00:59:42] Speaker B: By the way, this is a Proverbs 31, Wife.
Go look that up.
[00:59:48] Speaker A: Yeah, well, I just.
I feel so strongly about this. You know, the Lord had spoken to me about this one time, you know, and it really does.
It's backed up by scripture. But, you know, he told me, he says, you're to make no decisions, no decisions whatsoever without asking me first.
And he paused, and then he added to it, he says down to the minutia.
And John 15, 5 says, for part from me you can do Nothing.
And James 4, if you read James 4:13 through 15, it talks about, you know, Paul says, today or tomorrow we will. We will go and do this in that city and spend a year there, carry on business and make a profit. And he says, you don't even know what will happen tomorrow.
What is your life? You're a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.
Instead, you ought to say, if the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that.
As it is, you boast in your proud intentions. All such boasting is evil.
Anyone then who knows the right thing to do yet fails to do it is guilty of sin. You know, decision making should always be God's decision, not yours. You know, and when people divide, when churches divide, when there's sectarianism, that was not God's decision. That was not what he intended for his church.
But, you know, people divide over what they believe.
And what you believe is a very powerful place.
But just know that, you know, demons don't care what you believe.
They only care that you cause division by what you believe.
And if he can divide the church, which he has done, he's been very successful, you know, so it's really important for people to realize that this is God's church. They are not the head of the church. They have been given as stewards over the church.
And any decisions made in within a church should be not through a vote, not through consensus, not through.
It should be in prayer and fasting and seeking the Lord's face for the decision that's to be made.
And we're just not seeing that.
[01:02:48] Speaker B: The devil had an opportunity to divide the church in the book of Acts.
And that's our model for how we should be.
God separated Barnabas and Saul to go bring the Gentiles into the vine.
And there was an issue in the church because the other apostles were Jewish. And now Paul, who God separated for this, persecuted the Jews. Now he's in paganistic areas.
And what do they do? Paul comes back to Jerusalem and they have what's called the Jerusalem Council. They listen to each other. And actually, James, the head of the church at the time, is the one that has the biggest problem with this. But they come up with the solution. Those people don't have to become Jewish to become believers in Christ.
The devil tried to divide the church, and the early church said, no, we're going to go by what the Holy Spirit says. And it didn't divide then.
It learned how to deal with itself right then. And we don't see that now.
So unity in the church is not going to come by man trying to force that unity. And it isn't going to mean that a group of us can watch a baseball game today. That's not what that's supposed to be.
[01:04:21] Speaker A: You know, it does. And it doesn't matter what, you know, what your intention is. I mean, there's been a lot of things that have been done with extremely good intention, but because the Lord knows better and more than we do. For example, I had stepped in to help a certain individual financially because of some things that were taking place in their life.
And I went against what God wanted for that person. He wanted that person to fall. He wanted that person to be face down in the gutter. Because that's what it was going to take for them to turn around and look up to him.
[01:05:00] Speaker B: Yes.
[01:05:01] Speaker A: And because I got them out of the trouble that they were in, you know, what the Lord wanted to accomplish in their life did not take place.
Yet, you know, my heart, I was. I was doing what I could to help this person when I didn't ask the Lord, is this your will for me to do this? And I did it, and I really messed up in a very big way.
So, I mean, your intentions can be, you know, so honorable yet is it
[01:05:36] Speaker B: what God wants in our own eyes? In Our own eyes. Yes, Scriptures.
[01:05:42] Speaker A: So.
And just one other thing. When you were talking about a move of God, and I've seen moves of God, I've been in a move of God.
You know, if you're interested in knowing, you know, what it looks like, you go to 2nd Chronicles 5, 13, 14. This is one specific move of God. But when they were dedicating the temple, the Levites, who were the singers and, and whatnot, they were the ministers, the glory of God came in and it put them down on the floor on their faces. And it says right there that they couldn't minister to the people because the cloud, the glory cloud that had rolled in. But you know, I've also been places where there was a sovereign move of God and healing, where, you know, a group of 5,000 people in a conference that this, you know, God just sovereignly moved with nobody praying for them.
Like 40% of the people there got healed of something.
[01:06:39] Speaker B: And Jonathan Khan gave a testimony in India where, where the Holy Spirit told him to bring the shofar.
[01:06:48] Speaker A: And when he knew the shofar. Yeah.
[01:06:50] Speaker B: When he preached and was done, he was led by the Spirit to blow the shofar. And there were thousands and thousands of people in that field.
It was a mass exorcism.
[01:07:00] Speaker A: Yes.
[01:07:01] Speaker B: He said he saw they were demon possessed. A lot of demons came out of people.
And so how many people do that?
He's never been asked to do that again. That was one time, one instance. But he did it.
[01:07:16] Speaker A: Yes. So that's a move of God, you know, just.
[01:07:23] Speaker B: And that can happen in every church. I'll tell you, there was a move of God last Tuesday. Not this Tuesday, the Tuesday before, between 12 people that got together at a house that were hungry for God and they were learning how the Holy Spirit works.
And they made a commitment and the glory of God came upon them. The Spirit of God moved on them. It was beautiful thing.
So that's what's happening. You're going to see people departing from organizational structures that are hungry and not getting what they need. And the more they read the Bible and the less they see this happening, they're going to want to gravitate to people that can teach them those things, other people. And that's what's happening now.
You've got people in clusters doing that.
And it's, it's being led by the Spirit. So I'll close on that.
Father, we thank you that we can stand steadfast on the truth that the word of God is a rock to stand on. And when we build our house on the rock. The winds can come, the rain can come, anything can come. And it will not erode those people, the spiritual ones, but the carnal people that have built their faith on the sand are going to blow away. And Father, I just pray for those that are drifting right now, that are drifting away.
If you would bring them back. Prodigal means that they become an excess of something. There's prodigals all over the world.
Every one of us has become excess in something if we're not careful before we ever see it. So I. I ask you to bring every prodigal home so that you can kiss them on our. Kiss us on our necks, kill the fatted calf and celebrate.
And I ask the Lord that on this night, let it be that you leave the 99 and go get the one that drifted.
The one that drifted that you know.
And then I ask you to bring your spirit of conviction upon the 99 that perhaps think that there's no sin in them, nothing to change in their hearts because the ways of man, of humans, says we're okay to give them the truth, God, and prick us in our hearts. Hearts in Jesus name. Amen.
[01:10:09] Speaker A: Holy, holy, holy Lord God Almighty
[01:10:22] Speaker B: early
[01:10:24] Speaker A: in the morning our song shall rise to the holy, holy, holy.
