Transcript

Sermon Transcript: The Making of a Man

10/30/2022 Jeff Schwarzentraub 49 min read

Father in heaven, we give you all the glory and all the honor and all the praise for who you are. And Lord, we ask that in these minutes that we have together, that you would speak faithfully from your Word through me to your people, that we would be transformed by your word. Because Lord, we believe that every time your word is faithfully and accurately proclaimed, that you speak, that you direct, that you guide, that you have a word for us today if we're willing to listen. And so now, for all those who have gathered here today, who desire to hear the Lord speak directly to you, who will believe what He says and then who will by faith put into practice what He shows you, will you agree with me very loudly this morning by saying the word, amen? Amen.

A couple decades ago after I finished seminary, I was preaching at my home church in Peoria, Illinois. And when I finished preaching, I watched this guy come forward and I recognized him from high school. He was there with his new wife and when he came up, he said these words to me. He said, "My mom said you were going to be here today and I had to come see this for myself. What in the world happened to you?" He said, "You're not the same guy I played baseball with in high school. You're not the same guy I watched run around. What changed?" And I told him how the Lord Jesus had changed my life.

He knew the gospel. He was just having a hard time believing that God still changed people. Right? Do you know that God still does transformative work in people's lives today? That the gospel is not just a set of creeds or rules or do's and don't, but when we align ourselves in long-term obedience with the God of the Bible, that He transforms who we are, that He makes us into something that He wants?

As we're studying the Book of Exodus, it's been a great study because we see how God calls a man and we see as this man is being made by God, the making of this man. He looks different in chapter 11 than he is going to look in verses three and four. When God calls him in three and four, his stature and his stance is, "I don't know that it's me. I mean, really cool that this bush is on fire but not burning. I'm impressed. Really neat that you want to go deliver the Israelites, but I think you got the wrong guy. Go find somebody else for that kind of work. I got more important things to do. I'm enjoying being a shepherd." When God continues to press, he says, "You know what? How about get my brother Aaron. He's a better speaker than me. You got the wrong guy."

God did not have the wrong guy. And the reality is, when we go all in with Jesus Christ, He still transforms us today. You say, "Well, what's the big deal?" Here's the big deal. There's a lot of people in churches today that falsely believe that God only can use some in the ministry. Those are called pastors or worship leaders or staff, but that for the rest of us, well, what else is there? I'm kind of doing enough. I attend church fairly regularly and I'm a pretty nice person. I want to tell you on the authority of God's Word, that if you go all in with Jesus and you have long term obedience in the same direction that He leads you, He will transform every single part of your life. That He can use you in the same way that you hear about or you read about in God's Word.

As I was preparing for this week, I hope you've enjoyed the study of Exodus about half as much as I have. I mean, it's been phenomenal for me to study this all fresh, all again. And when you're teaching through a book, it's hard to know where to stop. What passage are we going to take? How far is the preaching portion actually going to be? And I had intended to get all the way into chapter 12 today because we'll be super familiar with chapter 12. The slaying of the spotless lamb, the blood on the door posts, the exodus of the people of Israel going out of Egypt, all the stuff that we'll remember. But as I got into chapter 11 and I started reading it and started saying, "No, we're going to pause right here," because in those short 10 verses, we see the making of a man.

We see the transformational power of God in anybody that will continue to walk with God. If you're a person and said, "I wish God could use me, or I wish God could use me more than He is," I believe God has a word for you. Today I'm going to invite you to open up your Bible to Exodus chapter 11, Exodus chapter 11. I want to read through it because it's only 10 verses long so you can hear it and have your heart set on it. And then we'll unpack these verses together and take a look at God's transformational power. I titled this message The Making of a Man because He's talking specifically about Moses, but the same would be true, this is how he transforms women. This is how he transforms boys and how he transforms girls. This is for anybody that will walk with Him in obedience.

Notice what He says. It says, "Now the Lord said to Moses, one more plague, I will bring on Pharaoh and on Egypt. And after that he will let you go from here. When he lets you go, he will surely drive you out from here completely. Speak now in the hearing of the people that each man asked from his neighbor and each woman from her neighbor, for articles of silver and articles of gold. The Lord gave the people favor in the site of the Egyptians. Furthermore, the man, Moses himself, was greatly esteemed in the land of Egypt, both in the sight of Pharaoh servants and in the sight of the people. Moses said, thus says the Lord about midnight, I am going out into the midst of Egypt and all the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die from the firstborn of pharaoh who sits on the throne even to the firstborn of the slave girl who is behind the millstones, all the firstborn of the cattle as well.

Moreover, there shall be a great cry in all the land of Egypt as there has not been before and such as shall never be again. But against any of the sons of Israel, a dog will not even bark, whether against man or beast that you may understand and know that the Lord makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel. All these your servants will come down to me and bow themselves before me saying, go out, you and all the people who follow you. And after that, I will go out. And he went out from Pharaoh in hot anger. Then the Lord said to Moses, Pharaoh will not listen to you so that my wonders may be multiplied in the land of Egypt. Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharaoh, yet the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart and he did not let the sons of Israel go out of his land."

And here what we see in chapter 11 is super connected to chapter 10. What we've seen so far, just to give you a little highlight on what God has done is he's called his servant Moses to let his people go. Moses's sermon, his talk to the Pharaoh, was let my people go that they may serve me. Moses wanted all the people of Israel, the men, the women, the boys and the girls and all of their animals to go out in the wilderness and God would show them how to worship. And what we've seen is when Pharaoh hardened his heart towards the Lord, God began to harden Pharaoh's heart towards Him. People wonder, was God hardening his heart or was Pharaoh hardening his heart? Here's the answer, you ready? Yes. When you bring a hard heart towards God, it hardens even more. When you bring a tender heart towards God, He can soften it.

Man is without excuse. If you have a hard heart towards God, that's your problem. The God of all grace and mercy is willing to soften your heart, but you have to do it on His terms. Because Pharaoh wouldn't do that, God sent plague after plague after plague after plague. We went through nine of them. I'll walk through them really quickly. You'll remember the Nile that was turned to blood. Basically God showing I can shut down your entire economic system with one touch of Moses' staff. We saw the frogs basically talking about the fertility god and God was saying, "I'm the God of and the giver of life." We saw the gnats and the lice, the gnats and the lice. We saw the God of nature and order and God was saying, "I'm the one. I'm the God of nature and order."

We saw the flies that came upon the land. The fly was representing the God who was the protector and God was saying, "I'm the protector of everyone." Then we saw the killing of all the livestock. We saw the Egyptian god that was the sacrificial intermediary and He was showing, "I'm going to be the mediator between God and man. It's me that you serve." Then He sent boils which showed that the warrior king of Egypt was not the true warrior king, that God is the warrior king that heals. Then we saw the locust. The locust was the Egyptian resurrection god and Jesus was saying, "I'm the resurrection God." And then we saw this final plague, this ninth plague that we've been through of darkness and God was showing that He's the God of light. He's the God of order. You worship this God of the Son. I turn on and off the lights, I created the son.

And in every way we see Pharaoh continue to say he had a hard heart. Last week we showed how he gave lip service, "You can go now, please go." But then he would do what? He would harden his heart. And we talked about the fact that repentance is always accompanied with behavior. If you're truly repentant, you will change your behavior. Lip service doesn't mean anything. Lip service is not repentance. And over and over, Pharaoh has done this all the way as we got through chapter 10, and as he got through chapter 10, Pharaoh was so upset, he told Moses, "You will never see my face again." And Moses responded and said, "You are right. I shall never see your face again."

Chapter 10, those first couple of verses, those first three verses are parenthetical. It's telling us what God had shared with Moses, and then chapter four is going to buttress right up to the end of chapter 10. This is all one complete thought. So as we get into this, let's talk this morning about how God transforms people; how God makes a man, how God makes a woman, how God grows us through long term obedience in the same direction. And here's what God does. As God grows us in obedience, God transforms your ears with His voice and He transforms your eyes with His favor. As you walk in obedience to the Lord long enough, God will transform your ears with His voice and your eyes with His favor. Notice verse one, "Now the Lord said to Moses, one more plague I will bring on Pharaoh and on Egypt, and after that he will let you go. When he lets you go, he will surely drive you out completely."

What's he telling him? He's telling him there's going to be a 10th plague. And what we don't see is Moses saying, "Why? Come on. How many more times do I have to go back? Why are we doing it this way? I don't understand." God's telling him, "This is what's going to happen, and after the 10th when he is going to drive you out," and you can see Moses confident in the voice of God, like if that's the way you're going to do it, then that's the way you're going to do it, and I'm done arguing with you. As you continue to grow in your relationship with the Lord, you need to hear His voice. Hearing the voice of God is an absolute must for you to grow.

You cannot grow in your Christian faith without hearing the voice of God. It's impossible. I mean if you're hearing impaired and you go to a concert and you see everybody clapping at the same time and singing the same lyrics, you may feel a little bit left out. Maybe you'd feel some of the base coming off the stage, but you wouldn't be able to participate to the full, and you'd have to look around at what other people are doing and try to clap when they clap and try to sing when they sing and try to do when they do what they do. And it would be miserable. Why? Because you can't hear it. Do you know there's a lot of people that attend church just like that?

They come to church not because they're hearing the voice of God, they come to church to learn their religious routine. When to stand, when to sit, what to do, how to do it, how to go through the routines, how to go through the rituals. Can I just tell you? God does not care about your rituals and your routines. He cares about what He has prescribed in His Word and He wants you to respond to His voice. Jesus said in John 10, "My sheep..." Know what? "My voice." It would be interesting if when you got to heaven there was door number one, door number two and door number three, and you got to listen to who was behind it and choose the door.

Now that's theologically incorrect, just so you know it doesn't happen, but I wonder if you could pick the right door. Are you acquainted with the voice of God? I mean when it comes to your phone, there's certain people that could call, you could just pick up, and when they say hello, even if you didn't see the caller ID and you didn't know who it was, you would know who it was just by the way they said hello. You would know what kind of mood they're in, just by the way they said hello. You would know what kind of day they're having just by the way they said hello. You would know if they're mad at you or happy with you just by the way they say hello.

Are you acquainted with the voice of God like that? God wants us to know Him and be so intimately acquainted with Him that we know what he's going to say sometimes even before He says it. When I played football in high school, we used to signal our plays in from the sideline and there were a couple times during the season where I'd be doing this, like repeat it, but the clock was winding down and I had to get in the huddle. But if my coach who was 30, 40, 50 yards away would start mouthing what the play was, I knew what it was. I was so familiar with his voice, even among all the crowd. Do you know the voice of Jesus like that?

God wants to speak to you, and one of the ways that God speaks to you and the primary way that God speaks to you, is through His living, active Word. This book right here, all 66 books that make up one book called the Bible is God's speaking. Any time you read it, study it, meditate on it, memorize it, hear it proclaimed or taught, you are hearing God speak. Did you know that? I believe all of this book is for sure. I believe all of this book is real. A steady diet of His Word will change your life. Now you've chosen to come to Brave and whether this is your first time at Brave or you've been coming here for years, I can tell you this, you will never ever have to worry about whether your pastor believes in the inherency and authority of the Word. Ever. This is what we believe.

I believe if you don't stand up here and proclaim this book, you're not giving God the time He wants, and I don't know what else you could possibly be talking about. It's interesting for me that some churches and some pastors that I've listened to, and there's several great ones out there, but some tend to apologize for whatever they're going to preach on any given Sunday, whether they're teaching on marriage, or the roles of women, or the roles in marriage, or divorce, or money, or the Bible, or creation, or the Book of Revelation, or spiritual gifts, or salvation, or even the culture, they stand up and say something like this. "Hey, before we get started today, I want you to know this is a very hard topic."

Well, of course, it's a hard topic because God is speaking things from His throne that fly in the face of everything that you and our culture believe to be true. And if a pastor's going to be a PR agent rather than a proclaimer and a heralder of God's Word, you can't hear what God's saying. And one of the reasons why the Bible is so offensive is because so few faithfully and accurately teach it. It's a shame. Amen? So if you were to say, "How am I going to hear God?" Here's what I would say. Start reading and studying the Bible, and not just so you become an expert in what the Bible says. In other words, I didn't know what a Corinthian was, now I know what a Corinthian is. I had no idea what a Philippian was, now I know what a Philippian is. Who cares?

Do you hear the voice of God when you read and will you apply what He's showing you? I didn't understand this when I first became a believer. I was told I needed to have what was called quiet time, which meant I needed to study the Bible and read it. And so, as I began to do that, just to be perfectly candid with you, there were times where I would read my Bible and this is me hindsight, 30 some years later, I would read it, and I would be so convicted that I thought I was a bad person. I thought God was mad at me every time I opened the Bible because I wasn't doing what He said I should be doing.

So there were times where I'm like, "I'm done with the Bible study thing. I feel worse after I study it than before." And I would close it and sit it on my shelf for a week. And then people say, "But you need the Bible." Okay, I need the Bible, Then I'd feel worse again. What I didn't realize at the time is that the Lord was showing me a new identity and the way in which I was living was not the way He wanted. And He loved me enough that He was showing me things that needed to change so that I could experience life to the full and enjoy the life I had in Christ. He was showing me that I was forgiven in Christ through the cross, but He was also showing me He wasn't going to lead me where I was at. Amen?

And what we need to understand is we need to hear His voice. The more acquainted with God's Word you become, the more acquainted with His voice you'll be. And I believe God can speak in other supernatural ways. I think God can speak through dreams and visions in a subjective voice that's down in your heart, but it will never, ever go against the written and authoritative Word of God ever. So the more acquainted you are with this book, the more you are going to be able to hear God subjectively, because this book is primary. Nothing changes in this book, nothing is added to it, nothing is taken away. And this is such a big deal. I mean this is so current. People say, "You need to make the Bible relevant."

The Bible is completely relevant in every single generation if you just preach it. And here's why I get fired up about it. In the denomination that I grew up in, that I left about 30 years ago, there's a debate now as to whether you should let homosexuals be ordained into the clergy. And it's not an issue of homosexuality, it's an issue of biblical authority. It's an issue of, do you believe the Bible to be true or do you believe man's opinions about the culture to be true? If you believe the Bible to be true, it's not even a debate. It's not even a debate. It's not even worth having a conference on, right? You just say, "Here's what God says and it's done and it's complete. Let's move on and do what He wants us to do."

But it seems like in every great move of God when people are trusting the Bible and moving that, that very movement that gets it started later on is going off the rails. I can say this because I was raised a Methodist. John Wesley would not be a Methodist and John Wesley would not be Wesleyan because he's a Bible bigot. He told us, there was only one book he believed in. It was the Bible. His followers as a general whole don't. And it's hard because I know several people who are Methodist who love Jesus with their whole heart, who are having to deal with all this garbage. May it never be.

Can we just champion the Word of God and hold the Word of God high and where we feel challenged or where we don't like what God has to say, just say this, "God, you need to change my heart because I'm uncomfortable with what you're saying, but I know you're right and I know I'm wrong, so change me." And when we live like that, God does something great. And what's even harder for me is listening to pastors try to placate and say how the cultures change and how you can't really trust the Bible anymore. And what I want to say back is Luke 9:26, Jesus said, "Anyone who is ashamed of me and my words, I'll be ashamed of him when I come." Well, what words? All of them. All of them.

Genesis 1:1 is the most difficult passage to believe. If you believe that, everything else easy. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Who created it all? God. How did He do it? He's going to tell you in chapter one and two. Well, if He did that, is anything else hard to believe? Is it hard to think He could become incarnate flesh and take a walk on a pond that He created? Is it hard to believe that He could feed 5,000 people with just five loaves and two fish? Not if you believe that out of nothing He made everything. It's just that we don't believe the Word.

Or we have pastors say, "Well, I don't believe that part, but I believe this part." Listen, Jesus said that this was the very Word that testified about Him, yet you refuse to come to Him to have life. Everything in this testifies about Jesus. To say that I don't believe some of this is to say I don't believe some of Jesus. It's all true, y'all. When God transforms you, He transforms your ears first. He gets you listening to a voice that's different than any other voice that you're going to hear. It goes counter to everything that you believed prior to believing.

God's still doing a work in my life. God's still speaking to me through His voice. God's still showing me things in His Word. I haven't arrived yet. None of us have arrived yet. But that's what He's doing with Moses. And He says that Pharaoh will surely drive him out of here completely. But notice what else. God not only transforms your ears with His voice, but He transforms your eyes with His favor. Notice what He tells Moses. He goes, "He's going to drive you out completely." And why is that important? Because God's ultimate plan for salvation is complete salvation. God doesn't want you to be kind of partially in and partially out. He doesn't want you to struggle with the same sin over and over for the rest of your life. What does He want?

He wants to take you from who you were and make you complete in Christ all the time. And notice what He says. He says, "Speak now in the hearing of the people that each man ask from his neighbor and each woman from her neighbor for articles of silver and articles of gold. The Lord gave the people favor in the sight of the Egyptians. Furthermore, the man, Moses himself, was greatly esteemed in the land of Egypt, both in the sight of Pharaoh servants and in the sight of his people." Do you see what's going on here? Do you see what He's saying? He's saying this, "Go to your neighbors and ask them for their gold and silver." Would that takes some courage? I don't think that's the applicational point for us today. It's not go to your neighbors and ask them for gold and silver. But that's what He was saying.

He's saying, "When you leave, you're going to leave with everything. I've already destroyed the nation. We're going to plunder everything. When you come with me, I'm giving you everything you need, because I'm a God that blesses and I'm a God of favor. That's what I do." And then what else does He say? He tells Moses that He was going to become favorable in all of Egypt. So Moses is the one bringing the plagues. Moses is the one that has brought God's Word to the people. And all of Egypt is suffering. Israel was mad when he got there because he made their work harder. And now what happens? Long term obedience in the same direction does what? It gives Moses stature in the sight of the Egyptians and it gives Moses stature in the sight of Israel.

Only God can do that. Now, a lot of people when I talk about favor, they're like, "You don't talk about favor. That's prosperity gospel. That's wrong." Well, I'm going to talk about it, because the Bible says that every good and perfect gift comes from the Lord. If there's anything good that happens when you don't deserve it, it's God. And what does the Bible make clear? The Bible makes clear that God is good. He says in the Bible, "You who are evil, who know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more your heavenly Father?" He's a good father.

The Bible makes clear this, that there's a problem in the world. The problem's sin. That's the root cause of every evil thing that we see, and you're responsible for it, and you've contributed to it. And if that's the case, and God is holy, righteous, and good and God's going to punish all those who are that way, then any good thing that happens is good. We ask questions like this, "Why are some children born stillborn? Why are some marriages not working out? Why are some people having a hard time? Why are some people..." A better question is this, "Why aren't all kids born still? Why don't all marriages break up? Why doesn't everybody have to beg?" Do you know why? Because God is good.

And if there's anything good that happens in your life, what are you called to do? Praise the Lord for every good thing you have. See, we've been trained by the enemy to look at every bad thing in the world and then say this question, "If God is so good, then why is it so bad?" God's answer is this, "It's so bad because of you. But let me tell you something, if you'll focus on what I'm doing, you will see glimpses of my goodness every single place that you look because I'm a good God." Amen?

And we have to have the right definition of prosperity. Prosperity does not mean perfect, unrelenting bliss. It doesn't mean that. If you're married, it's a great place to say amen. Or if you have kids, it's a great place to say amen. I mean, sometimes blessings are difficult and painful. Marriage is a total blessing. Having children's a blessing. Your health is a blessing. Financial prosperity's a blessing. This church is a blessing. It doesn't mean all those things are easy all the time. We have this false idea that prosperity means I can sit back and do nothing and God just gives me everything I want whenever I want. That's not prosperity.

Prosperity is God's goodness in the middle of hard things and challenges. And if we look for what's good in the middle of what's not so good, you'll see God's hand all over this world. This is my father's world. Psalm 24 says, "The earth is the Lord's and everything in it." Amen? God is a good God. He's a prospering God. I mean, think about this. Think about just some of these scriptures. You can write them down. I'll read them. Psalm 27:13 said, "I would've despaired had I not believed I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living." What am I going to see the goodness of the Lord? Here and now. What about Psalm 84:11? "No good thing will he withhold from those who walk up rightly." Psalm 34:8, "O taste and see that the Lord is good." Or how about Psalm 23:6, "Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever." Favor is His blessing and His goodness.

Think about this. We live as aliens and strangers in a hostile world, and in this world, here's the truth, the world lives for its gods, we live for Jesus Christ. The world lives selfish and demanding, we're called to be loving servants. The world lives hostile toward God, we're called to bring Him glory. The world focuses on the here and now. We know that our citizenship is in heaven and we eagerly await a savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ. I mean, that's what prosperity is. Prosperity is, this is temporary. Any prospering that you get in this world, temporary. It's just to show you God's good. It's just to remind you, it's not to hold onto. It's to see so that you can tell other people He's good.

I'm here to tell you on the authority of God's Word, the God I'm telling you about is good. God loves you with an unconditional love. God is so good. He sent His only begotten son to the earth to put on incarnate flesh for all eternity, who fulfilled the law, who restored glory to His dad and was slaughtered on a cross because of your sin, who rose from the dead and offered His life to you, because my God is so good. He's good. Amen? God's good all the time, and all the time God is good. I mean this is what we see. I mean we see Moses as He's been trained by the voice of God over time and God's telling him, "Hey, there's going to be a 10th plague," and you don't see Moses push back.

He's like, "If there's a 10th plague, there's a 10th plague." If you say he's going to drive us out, he's going to drive us out. I believe you. I'm attuned to your word enough that when you say it, I know it'll come to pass, even though it likely won't come to pass in my timing, God, I trust you. And you see God's favor. God told him, "Keep walking my way. There's favor that comes." See, we live in a microwave culture that here's what we think. We think favor means one step of obedience and then God's got to unpack the cart of every good thing.

Singles listen to me. Just because you live faithfully for one day as a single doesn't mean God's going to bring you, your spouse tomorrow. Married people, just because you hear a sermon that you know need to change in your marriage doesn't mean your marriage is going to be perfect tomorrow. Just because you hear that God's going to help you prosper financially doesn't mean it's going to necessarily be tomorrow. There's long term obedience in the same direction over time. That when God sees your heart and God sees your heart and God sees your heart, then He says, "I can entrust you with this because I got your heart. I got your heart now. If I give or if I take away, I know you're going to say blessed be the name of the Lord." That's what it means to be prosperous.

Prosperous is when God can take things or give things and it doesn't change your love for God, because you know He's good all the time. Amen? And that's what you see here. In this story Moses has changed. Moses heard the voice of God. He thought it was really cool that there was a bush that was burning but that wasn't consumed. He was like, "Nice trick, God. I like that. I see what you're doing." He's gone from Moses saying, "Not me, not me, not me," to, "Okay, cool. I've told him nine times. If you want me to tell him a 10th time, that's fine. If there's 22 more times that you want me to do the exact same thing, I'm yours. I'll do it. And if you say you're going to bring favor, I know you're going to bring favor. So I'm not afraid to tell people to ask their neighbors for silver and gold because I know you said to do it and if you said to do it, it's going to happen.

And I know that you are the one who elevates me. You're the one who does that. I'm just going to walk with you and let you elevate my stature." I read an Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, I used to read it every day years ago. But there's one date in there where he talks about how the devil and God want to take you to the high places. They're both trying to elevate you, but the way that the devil does it, he tries to get you to hold onto something earthly that you could never ever let go of. So as you get elevated, you got to hang onto that earthly god in order to keep your status. Whereas when God takes you to a high place, the only thing you're holding onto is God, and whether He gives or takes away, you still have the delight of Him that He's elevated you the way He wants.

I remember reading at the time about 30 years ago and thinking money was my thing because I was going to go after this job and I was going to go after this thing and I looked at guys 30 years older, I'm like, "Yeah, but they're trapped now because they can't get out of that." In order to keep their status, they got to keep their job. I never want to be like that. There's freedom in knowing that God can take you anywhere that you want, anywhere He wants, however He wants, wherever He wants and you don't care because you know that God's in control of your life. There's a ton of freedom in that, and that's where Moses was. If God told Moses, "You're going to be here another year, no problem, you're going to go now, I'm great with that too." And you're going to see it's going to be, we're going to go now.

After all this time, you're going to see the urgency next week because about the middle of the night, it's time to go and get everybody packed. And they're going to go because they're ready to follow God. God will transform and train your ears as you tune into Him and He'll transform your eyes so you can see His goodness and favor. Let me give you a second one. God will also transform your heart with His passion and your voice with His boldness. As you continue to walk with God, in your obedience to God, He will transform your heart with His passion and your voice with His boldness.

Now check out Moses. Where verse four fits is right after verse 29 of chapter 10. Moses said, "You're right. You will never see my face again." And these were his next words. Moses said, "Thus said the Lord, about midnight. I'm going out in the midst of Egypt and all the first born of the land of Egypt shall die from the first born of Pharaoh who sits on his throne even to the firstborn of the slave girl who is behind the millstones, all the firstborn of the cattle as well. Moreover, there shall be a great cry in all the land of Egypt such as there has never been before and shall never be again. But against any of the sons of Israel, a dog will not even bark. Whether against a man or beast that you may understand how the Lord makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel."

He continues, "All these your servants," he says to Pharaoh, "Will come down to me and bow themselves before me saying, 'Go out you and all the people who follow you,' and after that I will go out. And he went out from Pharaoh in hot anger." Has he changed? Is he a different guy now? I mean the first time we see him appear before Pharaoh God's telling him, "Drop your staff." He's got Aaron dropping his staff. He's a little nervous to do everything. He's going through the motions. He's doing what it is. There's a difference in Moses now. There's a passion and a boldness in him talking to Pharaoh that there wasn't at the beginning when he first got there.

I mean when he first got there and he begins to speak to Pharaoh and Pharaoh made the labor harder for Israel, I mean Moses was like, "Oh no, why did you bring me here? Why are you doing this?" Not anymore. He knows who he is in the Lord and he knows what he's called to do and he's not going to stop for anything. His passion's different. He's aligned in his heart. Now it's interesting, we prayed this here in Inglewood today from Mark 12: 30-31. It's also found in Matthew 22: 37-40. Jesus was asked, "What's the greatest commandment?" And what does He answer? You shall do what? You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and all your strength."

Now how many have heard that verse before? By show of hands? Do you? I mean, it means I'm going all in with Jesus, with every fiber of my being; with my heart, my soul, my mind, my strength. Everything about who I am screams Jesus. Everything about who I am is going after God. That's what I'm concerned about. Is that true of you? Jesus said, "That's how you know love God." That's the first and most important commandment. I was finishing up Eric Metaxas' book in light of his coming here in a couple weeks and he was talking about when we go hunting, we think hunting is standing at a distance with a rifle and putting something in our scope and then barely using our trigger finger to kill. We call that hunting. That's not what a lion calls hunting. A lion to go hunting goes all in on the hunt.

When Jesus is calling us, He's calling us to go all in. Now let me tell you what I mean by this. When I grew up, I knew what it meant to go all in, in sports. I skipped family vacations. I never missed a practice. Coaches could curse me out, I didn't care. I'm all in. I'm the guy. Right? My parents always wanted to see me go all in, in school. That didn't quite happen. But I knew what all in with sports was. I knew what it meant to go all in with my job when I had my job. I'm kind of an all or nothing person. That's how God made me. But when it came to the things of Jesus, even after I got saved, I never really saw somebody go all in.

I never saw people being called to a high level. I mean, if my coach told me to be in practice at 6:30 in the morning, guess when I was going to be there? Six, waiting for them to get there. But when it came to ministry it was always like, "Just don't worry about it. We're glad you're here." All this kind of stuff. Jesus says, "Go all in with me." One of the reasons that we don't grow is we don't go all in with Jesus. We keep Jesus on the periphery. We falsely think that there's a sideline in the kingdom. There's no sideline. Everybody's in the game. It's the most glorious intermural game you could ever be a part of. The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. And when you go in, you're on the field. And God says, "Now that you're in, go all in." You say, "Well, how do I know if I'm all in?" When you're willing to pray like this. Psalm 139: 23-24, "Search me oh God, know my anxious heart. See if there's any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting."

Lord, my life is yours, you've saved my life. It doesn't matter where you move me, what job you have me do, who you want me to marry, where you want me to live, my life is yours. However you want to lead me, use me, I just want to be obedient to you. Lord, is there anything that you've designed for my life that I'm not living right now? And if there is, would you please show me because I will change it for you? If you can pray that, you're all in. And for many of us, we're a lot like the rich young ruler that's willing to go through the religious things. I've kept all the commandments since I was a kid. I'm a pretty good person. I tithe, I do this stuff. And Jesus is like, "I don't care about your religion. I don't care about your lip service. I care about your heart."

You're telling me all these things that you say you believe but you don't do any of them. I mean, if I ask you what you believe, what do you believe? What would you do? What would you say? Would you take me to our church's doctrinal statement and say, "I believe that?" Would you take me to the Apostle or Nicene creed and say, "I believe that?" Would you take me to the Bible and say, "I believe that?" You know what Jesus would say? Even the devil believes that and is scared. Don't show me what you say you believe as a fig leaf to cover up your disobedience. Show me what you believe by how you're actually living.

I know that I'm the God of your money when I own your money. I know that I'm the God of your marriage when I'm the God of your marriage. I know that I'm the God of your kids when you let me lead your kids. I know that I'm the God of your job when you go anywhere that I want you to go. I mean, does God really have all your heart? One of the reasons we don't grow in our passion for the Lord is we don't go all in with the Lord. And we wonder, "It's not really working for me. This religion thing's not really working for me." Let me save you some time. This religion thing will never work for you. I don't care what religion you are, if it's even coming to Brave. I like the way they do music and I like the way they teach from the Bible. Great. How is it transforming your life? How is it making you closer to Christ? How are you going more all in with Jesus?

What's that look like? I mean, that's what's going on here. Moses is a different guy because he's spent time with the Lord. I mean we see the great church of Ephesus that Paul writes to by the time we get to the book of Revelation in about 96AD that they had grown weary of their first love. They had lost their first love. Jesus told that church, "I'm about ready to come and remove the lamp stand from your church because you don't even love me anymore. You once upon a time loved me but now return to your first love." Or how about the church in Laodicea? He says, "You're neither hot or cold. You're good for nothing. I'm about ready to vomit every time I hear your worship services because you're not all in with me."

You say, "Well, what's Jesus asking?" He's asking for everything. Why? Because He gave you everything. He created your life, He spoke life into you. He created who you are and He loved you enough to come and die on a cross for you and rise from the dead for you. He's given you everything you need for life and godliness. What could you possibly hold back from Him? So here's the lie of the enemy because he knows that, "Don't go all in with Him. You stay in control in this one area of your life. Don't go all in with Him. He'll let you down. You can give God everything, but don't give Him your dating life. You can give God everything, but don't give Him your marriage. You can give God everything, but don't give Him your finances. You can give God everything, but don't give Him your career path. You can give God everything but don't tell God you'll live anywhere you want, because you like Denver." Right?

No. A Christian says, "God, my life is yours. You can take me to Timbuktu and I don't care as long as I'm honoring you. As long as you're getting the best out of what you created me for." And there's great fulfillment when you go all in with the Lord. John 15:11 says, "I've been telling you these things so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be..." What? "Complete." I'm telling you, you go all in with me, there'll be greater joy than you've ever seen. And what God does is He transforms the heart. Your passions become different. And how do you know what your passions are? How do you know what other people's passions are? It's what they talk about. You can't help but talk about your passions.

I always know when single people are fired up about who they're dating because they can't help but talk about it. I know when people are enjoying their marriage because they can't help but talk about it. I know when people have a sports team they follow that they like, they can't help but talk about it. I mean, whatever it is on your heart that you're passionate about, you can't help but talk about it. Here's the question, does anybody ever hear you passionately talk about Jesus? Does anybody ever hear you passionately talk about what He's done in your life or how you want to see Him do that in their life? Because that would dictate whether your passion's growing.

I remember when I was growing up, how many remember the talk show host Larry King? I'm dating myself a little bit. Remember Larry King? I remember growing up he'd have these interviews, sometimes he'd have Billy Graham on there. But I always enjoyed the religious ones where he'd have about four different people. He'd have a Roman Catholic, which I always found interesting because growing up in the Midwest about every third person is Roman Catholic, and then he'd have a denominational person like a Presbyterian, a Methodist, a Lutheran or Baptist, then he would have an atheist, and then he would have some Bible believing, fundamentalist Christian.

And I remember as a kid when I would watch that, I would think that the Bible believing fundamentalist Christian was so doggone, narrow minded and all these things, I'd be, man, every time he talks he sounds arrogant. He has an answer for everything. I've become that guy. Right? Because the Word of God has changed me. I think God does have answers for a lot of things. I think He does speak authoritatively to a lot of things. And if Larry King were still alive and I was on his show, I'd sound a lot like him. What happened? My passion's different because I've spent time with the Lord in my walk and He's changed me. Man, I still like some of the things I liked before. You know I like sports. I like watching sports on Saturday. Sometimes I like watching on Sunday, but at the end of the day, that doesn't change my life.

Way more fired up about Jesus. Way more fired up about the gospel. Way more fired up about what God's going to do in our generation. Amen? And what happens is, is when you get passionate the second thing happens, is God transforms your heart with passion. He'll transform your voice with His boldness. Did you hear the way Moses spoke to Pharaoh? Moses is not telling Pharaoh, "Hey, at midnight tonight I'll be going out in the middle of Egypt and the first born will die." I mean that's not what he's saying. Do you get what he's saying? He's looking Pharaoh face to face.

He's like, "You're right. You will never see me again, because tonight at midnight I'm going out in the middle of your nation and I'm going to stand there, and God's bringing judgment down on you and everybody else; from your household, all the way to the slave girl that nobody knows the firstborn will die. By the way, all of your firstborn livestock, they're going to die too. And I'm going to let it be known that when it happens, that God's going to make a distinction between our people and your people. Not even a dog will bark at our people. Our people won't even know what happened. Your people will be crying in a way that they've never cried before and they'll never cry since. It'll be the worst day in the history of Egypt. I can promise you that. And I'm going from your sight right now."

It says, "Moses left in hot anger." That's biblical for he was ticked off. That's what it means. And he's saying, "We're out of here because God told me we're out of here and I know it's the time, and you've had every opportunity to respond. You've had every opportunity to get your heart right with the Lord and you didn't, and judgment's coming on you." Do you hear what boldness in him? It's different than how he started out with Pharaoh. What happens is when you develop your passion for the Lord, you get bold. Right?

All throughout the New Testament, we see this word boldness. I'll give you a few verses you can write down. I'll read them to you. Acts 4:31 says, "And when they had prayed, the place where they had gathered was shaken and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the Word of God with boldness." Second Corinthians 3:12, he says, "Therefore, having such a hope, we use great boldness in our speech." Paul as he's writing the Ephesians in Ephesians 6:19, "And pray on my behalf that utterance may be given me in the opening of my mouth to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel." Philippians 1:20, "According to my earnest expectation and hope that I will not be put to shame in anything but that with all boldness, Christ will be exalted now as always in my body, whether by life or by death."

Or First Thessalonians 2:2, "But after we had already suffered and been mistreated in Philippi, as you know, we had boldness in our God to speak to you the gospel of God amidst much opposition." You hear that? I mean, if you want to study the pattern for how God works and you don't need to go to church growth conferences to get it, I'll give it to you free of charge right here. Here's what you'll see. Whether in the book of Acts or in any church or in any movement that the Lord has had, it always starts in prayer. Always starts in prayer where God begins to kindle the hearts of His people and then they're filled with the Holy Spirit, which means this, they're controlled by what the Spirit wants. They're going to do what God tells them to do.

And you get a group of people together that are seeking the Lord that want to do what God wants them to do. The next thing that happens is they speak the Word of God with boldness, and the fourth thing that happens is God shows up and does miraculous things. That's the pattern. Prayer, the feeling of the Holy Spirit, speaking the word with boldness and God does the work. That's what happens. It happens in the Old Testament, it happens in the New. There is a boldness that comes with the gospel. It's more than just telling people facts. There's a boldness.

Now I look at this and you got to be careful on this because I think if we had social media at the time that Moses did what he did here and it showed up on Instagram and people were watching what he did, there'd be about half the people who call themselves Christians that would say something like this, "He's not being very nice. He's not being very loving. That doesn't sound very kind. If Moses was really serving the God I serve, he would've been much kinder to Pharaoh." Tell me I'm lying. That's what people say.

It is unkind to not warn people about the judgment that's coming if you genuinely love them. It is loving. You say, "Well, Jesus never acted like that." May I give you exhibit A in the temple where He took a chord and wounded into three strands and was whipping things and overturning the money changers and saying, "You took this place, my father's house, that was intended to be a house of prayer and you've turned it into a marketplace for yourself. You den of thieves." He was angry. That's not the Jesus I serve. It is the Jesus that I serve. The same one that's kind, the same one that's meek and mild, the same one that'll extend all the mercy and grace in the world to those who are repentant is the same one that says, "If you refuse, judgment is on you."

That if you haven't repented, the wrath of God is already on you. We were once upon a time, children of wrath, but God came through. Right? That's what Moses was doing. It's not unloving, it's not un-Christian, nor is it unkind to faithfully and boldly proclaim the Word of God. And there's a growing in it over time. The more passion you have for Jesus, the more bold you'll feel. And God uses all sorts of circumstances and your walk with Him to grow your boldness. I had the unfortunate experience this week of listening to myself on the radio.

I was driving and it was at a time I knew I wasn't on, but for some reason I was on, and I was listening to myself, which I don't like to do. And as I was listening to myself, I said, "Okay, that's truthful and that's okay." It was a sermon from a couple years ago and I was just like, "Bro, where's your passion?" I don't want to hear that sermon from two years ago. And I used to say two years ago, I say that about the sermons two years earlier and two years earlier, because God's growing my passion for Him. And as He grows your passion for Him, you can't help but speak about the things that the Lord is telling you to share.

I mean, you remember in the book of Acts, in Acts chapter four, after Peter and John were arrested and they were standing firm in the face of all the king, and they said there was salvation under no other name, by which men must be saved except the Lord Jesus Christ? The only way people can be saved is Jesus. And when they looked at these men who are ordinary, uneducated men, they realized that they had spent time with Jesus. If you'll spend time with Jesus and if you'll allow Him to share with you what He sees in the world and what He's called you to do in the world, it will grow your passion. There are things that you'll talk about, you'll say, "I never thought I'd ever talk about that."

Do you know one of the reasons that we're looking to start two Brave academies next fall, one here and one in Westminster? Is because we're tithing our kids to the devil in our current school system and he's winning, and it's one thing to sit around and talk about that, "Oh, it's so bad. The school systems are so bad," we're going to be proactive and make a difference.

And it doesn't mean that Brave is the only place to go, but it's one thing to see a problem, it's another thing to do something about it. When I moved out here, I never thought we'd plant a school, let alone maybe a thousand campuses with schools in every one, let alone try to change the whole nation. That's what our vision is. That's what we're going to do until Jesus gets back. Amen? When God gets ahold of your heart and He begins to say, "No, this is what it is and this is what it is," He unfolds one step at a time, the things that are coming that are next. That's what He wants to do in you. He transforms your heart with His passion. When you go all in with Jesus, you become more passionate about it, which translates into a bold, resolute voice. God wants you to use your bold, resolute voice.

Even you that would say, "I'm an introvert." You introverts, you have some of the deepest relationships with people in the world. He may not ask you to stand on a platform and speak, but how about with the two or three people you have deep relationships with? Do they hear the boldness in your voice for Jesus? Right? That's what He's talking about. And then third, God says this, "As you walk with Him in long term obedience, as He makes you into the man He wants you to be, as He makes you into the woman He wants you to be, God transforms your mind with His peace and He transforms your walk with His power. He transforms your mind with His peace and your walk with His power.

Notice this, verse nine. This is after he bursts out in hot anger. "Then the Lord said to Moses, Pharaoh will not listen to you so that my wonders will be multiplied in the land of Egypt." What's Moses' responsibility? His responsibility is to go to Pharaoh and say, "Let my people go." How many times has he done it? Over and over and over again. So here's what he does. Here's what God says to him after he's done everything God's asked him to do. "Good job. It's not going to work. You preached for nothing." I mean, I think about Noah preached for 120 years and saw eight people saved and they were all out of his own family. Right? I mean, it's not about the response you get that shows your faithfulness to the Word of God. It's about what God does. But notice Moses, he's got a peace.

In verse 10, we don't see him complain or whine. Like, "I knew I should have never come. Why did you do this? What a waste of time it was." You don't see it. You know why? Because he has peace. Do you know you can have peace too? The Bible says that we start our peace with the Lord. Romans 5:1 says, "Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. You can have peace with God in the middle of this crooked and depraved world. Or how about Philippians 4:6-7, "Be anxious for nothing but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God and the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus."

Did you know you can have peace in this world? I think my conviction continues to grow and my passion for the Lord continues to grow, and hopefully my boldness continues to grow, but I sleep good. If I don't see things change, that's God's job. He's the only one that can make change. He's the only one that can do it. I still have peace in my heart. I mean, I still see that it's up to the Lord, it's not up to us. We get to respond to whatever we hear, and if we do respond to what God does, He'll do amazing things among us and I want to see that. But if for some reason He doesn't do that, He doesn't choose to do that or we don't respond the way He wants, I still have peace with God.

I just want to know I'm doing what God wants me to do, but I'm still going to sleep okay at night. I'm still going to have a relationship with my wife and my kids and do all those things. If I don't see that God's leading my kids just the way I want, or if I don't see my marriage going just the way I want or I don't see my finances going just the way I want, I still have peace. God, you're the God of order. You're the God that's bringing all... I still love you, Lord. Whatever you choose to do. That's where Moses is at. He's got peace with God. Why? Because he realized we don't work for God. We belong to God and God works through us.

Did you hear that? We don't work for God, we belong to God. He's the one that works through us. He says to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. It's the holy Spirit in us. It's Christ in us. The hope of glory. That's what He's talking about. Do you trust His peace? I mean, it's one thing to get fired up about the things of God and then steamroll people. It's another thing to get fired up about the things of God and do the things He's called you to do and then have peace. He's the prince of peace, chillax.

He's got this. Right? And notice this, as He transforms your mind with His peace, He's also going to transform your walk with His power. Notice what verse 10 says, "Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharaoh." Performed them all. They did all sorts of supernatural things before Pharaoh, yet the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart and he did not let the sons of Israel go out of his land. Why did Pharaoh harden his heart? Why did God harden Pharaoh's heart? Because when you bring a hard heart to God, God's going to harden it even more. Five times I think we read that Pharaoh hardened his heart, five times we see God hardened Pharaoh's heart. Right? Both go together.

What's God looking for? A soft heart. Today if you hear His voice, do not harden your heart. You have responsibility for your heart. You can only control your heart. You can't change anybody else's heart. But if you have peace with God and you're growing, guess what God's going to do through you? He can do supernatural things through you that you would never even imagine. Can I just say that one more time? He can do supernatural things through you, you can't even imagine. See, in the west we have this theology that's so weak and anemic that we'll ask things like this. How come God doesn't do all the things that we read about in the Bible? How come when I read what Jesus did in the gospels and how come when I see what the apostles did in the Book of Acts, He just doesn't seem to do that stuff anymore?

Well, He does. And usually all it takes is a mission trip going somewhere in the world where you have to pray and be filled with the spirit and speak the word boldly, and then you begin to see those things happen. You see demons manifest themselves. You see physical healings, you see all those things. And then you ask this question, why is it not happening in America to the fullest extent? Here's why. Because you're not going all in with Jesus. You're not walking in the same direction long term with Jesus. So then we have errant theology where people that sit in seminaries will say things like this, "Because we don't see it, God has ceased doing what He's already done."

He ceased that after the first century. He doesn't do that stuff anymore. So we give people a false theology that the same God, that's the same God yesterday, today and forever is now anemic and can't do what He did yesterday, today and forever. The problem is not God. It's the same God. He'll do all the same things. The problem is us because we've been dumbed down to believe the false lie of the enemy that says God doesn't do that stuff anymore. He does it all. Now, do you remember Jesus when He came down off the mount of transfiguration and a father brought his son to Jesus and said, "My son keeps throwing himself into the fire. He's got something going on in him. I brought them to your disciples and they could do nothing."

And Jesus said, "You perverse and wicked generation, bring the boy to me." The father said, "Well, if you can do something that'd be great." He goes, "If I can?" I can do all things for him who believes. And he heals the boy. Now, not at that time but later when they could save face, the disciples asked Jesus, "How come we couldn't do that?" And what does Jesus say? This type only comes out by what? Prayer and fasting. Now we read that as Americans and we think this, "Well, what prayer? What specific prayer do I pray so I can do miracles? How many meals do I have to skip in order for God to do miracles?"

See, that's not what He's talking about. He was talking about long term prayer and seeking the face of the Lord. Long term fasting of saying, "I'm going to go without food because I want the things of God," and you walk in a way where you're hungry for the things of the Lord and you're seeking His face and knowing His voice and you're transformed by His passion and you're transformed by His boldness, and that's really what you want. Then God's able to do things through you, you would never imagine. That's why you don't see Him. Because for many of us, we think that there's some magic prayer we can pray or some certain thing we can do and then it's all going to work out.

But we don't expect that in any other area in our life. If you were a young guy and you wanted to play professional sports and you asked somebody, "Hey, how long do I need to practice?" What would they tell you? "Over and over and over again." If you said, "Well, more than a half an hour a day?" Yes. Maybe consume your whole life with it. That's what I'm telling you about Jesus. You want to see God do the most work through your life? Go all in with Jesus. He will transform your life. He will use you for things that you couldn't otherwise be used for. And He's no respecter of persons. He's not looking down and saying, "That guy's talented and that gal's talented. I can use them."

All of us are sinners in need of God's grace. And apart from Him, we can do nothing. Do you trust His power? Because I do. I trust His power. The more I get to know Him, the more I believe that He can do everything I read about in the Bible is the same God that can do everything today. Doesn't mean I get to demand it of Him, doesn't mean he's required to do it, to prove himself to me. But I know he's able and I want to see him walk that way, and I'm hungry to see him walk that way. And I want to see us as a congregation see him walk that way. Right? Because there's more to coming to church than just hearing a word and singing some songs. There's the transformational power of God.

Whereas we hear Him, we take the next step. Now I know what some of you were thinking. If I get home tonight and I go out on my back porch and I'm sitting around my fire pit and God speaks to me through it, but it's not burning and He tells me what to do, I promise I will do whatever He says. But I find that's not how God really works. Sometimes it's in a certain little verse of scripture, a certain whisper, and He keeps saying the same thing over and over again. It doesn't seem like a big deal. Something like this, "Please date your wife. Please respect your husband. Please live pure before me. Stop drinking. Be done with drugs. Leave that group of friends and find new ones." Right? It's those little things.

Do well in school. Do your best at your job. Quit talking bad about that person behind their back. Don't slander them. All those little things that you think, "Well, that's not a big deal. Give me the big thing." That is the big thing. Those little steps, it's that little step is taking this and then this and then this, and then this. And sometimes it's like you need to go tell that person you were wrong and ask for their forgiveness.

Yeah, I don't want that. I just want to know what you're calling me. No, just go do that. What is it He's calling you to do? What's the next step of obedience? Because the next step leads to the next step, which leads to the next step, which leads to the next step, which leads to the next step. And over time if you continue to do this, it's called a walk; step, step, step, step, step. And you'll find yourself when you look over your shoulder saying, "I know it's not me, I know it's the Lord." Will you allow Jesus to search your heart? Will you allow Jesus to try you? Are you willing to stand before Him and say, "I'll do whatever you want me to do?" Or would you have the courage to even say, "Lord, I don't know that I'm quite there yet. I want to be able to pray that, but in reality, I know as I'm praying that I'm not willing to do that. Could you please help change my heart so that I could pray that prayer?"

What's the next step for you? Because if you can get to a place where you can start walking in obedience to Him, then you'll say, "Oh, praise the name of the Lord our God. Praise His name forever more." Because friends, one day's coming where we're all going to stand before Him, but we're all going to stand before Him and we're going to give an account for our life, and He's not going to care where you went to church. He's not going to care what the doctrinal statement read. He's not going to care all the scripture you had memorized. He's going to care, what did you do with what I showed you? What did you put into practice? What's God calling you to do?

That's what He's asking you to do. And if you're here today and you've never trusted Jesus, make today your day. I'm just here to tell you, He loves you so much that you would never be more satisfied than to have a relationship with Him. He's not asking you to join our church, He's not asking you to get religion, He's not asking you to jump through any psychological hoops. He's telling you, "Hey, why don't you repent of your sin and invite me into your life and I'll take you to places you never even dreamed were possible." That's what He's asking. Isn't that what we all desire? To see God use us and be fulfilled in Him?

And He's willing to do that for any single person here. Amen? Would you stand as we pray? Father, that we give you glory, honor and praise, and Lord, we ask that you would use the words this morning that were spoken from your living and active Word to transform us, to change us, and to make us into your image. Lord, through your Holy Spirit right now, show us the next step. If your next step is salvation, of trusting the Lord to be your savior." Would you pray with me?"Lord Jesus, I know I'm a sinner and in need of you. I want to turn from my sins and turn to you. Come into my life and be my Lord. And Lord, for all of us who know you as Lord, show us the next step. Give us the courage to take it, even if we don't know how. Lord lead our lives. We give you praise. We give you praise Jesus because you have the name that is above every name. We praise your name in the mighty and matchless name of Jesus. All God's people agreed and said, "Amen, amen." Can we give God praise this morning.