October 3, 2008

• It’s all about Him sermon & video by Pastor Don

  Today you can choose your medium.  Below is the video of this sermon.  The first few seconds is a test pattern and the video is 30 minutes long.  If you would rather read, I have included the slightly edited closed captioning for the video.  I tend to get rid of a few repetitions and make it into paragraphs for easier reading.  Remember [ ] brackets are what the congregation says.  Three dots … means a pause in the dialogue. I included the video because of the passion with which this was taught.  Sometimes words on a page do not do justice to the teaching.

   

  This blessed me so much.  I pray your weekend is awesome.

   

  Heather

   

   

   

  SAY AMEN

  SHOW 104

  IT’S ALL ABOUT HIM

  9/14/08

   

  The battle had been fierce and there were many slain and laid on the battlefield. They were carrying the wounded and the broken bodies bringing them to a place where they could medically take care of them and minister to them.  There was this lieutenant who was trained in medical things and he had gotten hurt.  But, because he was well connected back in the states, they didn’t put him in the tents with the other men.  They put him in a separate place far from the rest of the soldiers.  Because he was selfish, immature, well connected, and because he understood medical things, he was giving the nurses a hard time.  He was demanding, “I should get more attention.  You should be bringing me this, you should be taking care of that.  Can’t you see, I’ve got a wounded leg?” One of the nurses, put up with it for days.  She finally got sick of it and she gave him a crutch and she said, “Come, with me.”  She hiked him down the path to the other tent…and said, “Go inside.”  The young man hobbled inside. His leg was wounded, but he saw on the cot to the right of him the man had no arm.  The next cot, he saw the man had no legs.  To the next cot, he saw a guy who had a huge cavity blown into his chest.  He heard the moaning and groaning of the men that were in way worse shape than he.  By the time he got to the end of the tent, after seeing all of this, with a crutch in one hand…he reached over, began taking medical supplies off the table, and asking the nurses what can I do to help?…What can I do…to help?…

   

  Today’s message will help you, but it will be difficult for some of you because you are still like the young man in the tent.  Worried about your wounds, feeling well connected…and wondering, what about me?  Is somebody going to take care of my stuff?…Is somebody going to realize how wonderful I am and how well connected I am?  And don’t you see I’m hurting and I’m in pain?…But there comes a place when we have to realize that this song, (Heather’s comment – It’s all about You is the song)  is a cry from the heart of someone. That when he wrote it,… he had finally had to come to grips with reality.   That it wasn’t all about him.  That it was about God.  It’s about Jesus Christ.  We’ve sung this song now in the Body of Christ, for over 10 years…And the other day as the men were singing it at the meeting, as the tears were welling up in my eyes, the anointing of the teacher rose up in me and said, “But have you taught that?  And is it in Scripture?”…Is it in scripture that it is all about Him?  And that it’s really not all about us? 

   

  The Church has failed to get the message across because we’ve tried to give people the Gospel that if you come to Jesus, he will take care of all your stuff.  Which then puts us at the center focus that I’m going to come and get saved because it is all about me…And I want to belong to a church that realizes that when I walk in the door, it’s all about me.  Matter of fact, I’m looking for a pastor that, that figures it out, that it really is all about me.  I am.  I’m looking a pastor that never, never offends me, never insults me, never tries to get me to volunteer to do something I don’t want to do.  I want a pastor that never hurts my feelings, or ever says anything wrong, or realizes that when I call, he’d better be there. [laughter]  He’d, he’d better be there when I call.  And if I have to wait more than a week for an appointment, I’m going to have to get him straightened out.  [laughter]  And if he takes too many offerings, [laughter]  I have to straighten him out.  It is, you know.  And we do that.  It’s all about I’m going to come to a church where they better take care of my kids, and nobody better lay a hand on my unruly, poorly trained, disorderly child.  [laughter]  Cause why?  We do have this mentality, it is all about me.  Better not sit in my seat and you better not take my parking spot.  And you better not preach a sermon that makes me feel bad.  [laughter] 

   

  Today’s not that day.  [laughter]  Today’s not that day.  After I’m done with you in the next 30 minutes, you’re going to feel better.  Because you’re going to realize it is all about Him.  [hallelujah]  Let’s go to the book of John…  The book of John.  Do you like that opening?  [amen, yeah]  That work for  you?  Good.  Chapter 1…What I want to show you in a few scriptures and a few passages is that it is all about Him.  It is all about God.  The most difficult thing I think for people to realize is that you are not the Creator.  That you are a created being and you are only here for a short time.  [amen]  I think we need to more often come to grips with that reality.  The reality is that, as the Bible says, we’re but flowers passing away.  And then the wind comes  and whoooow, blows the remnants of us away and there’s nothing left.  It is all about Him.  It is.  And when we can realize that it’s really about God, we can then find our proper place in the whole thing.  And then guess what’ll happen?  Then it will be about us.  We’ll be happy.  We’ll be happy, happy.  Happy, happy, happy.  You really can.  Watch this now.  What does it say here? 

   

  It says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was in the beginning with God.”  And let’s all read it together, come on.  “All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.”  Keep going. “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.  And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.”..Woooo all about you, Jesus. 

   

  Well, how does that work out?  It gives us a different name, there’s no name here of Jesus.  There’s no mention of Nazareth here.  What John is revealing to us is that in the beginning was the Logos, or the Word.  And then he says, “and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was in the beginning with God.”  And then we can think to ourselves, you know, if I don’t understand that, you should explain it to me in better detail.  Well, I have good news and bad news.  Which do you want first?  [the bad news]  Ok, the bad news is, you wouldn’t understand it if He did explain it to you.  [right, laughter]  You know what the good news is?  [what's the good news?]  You wouldn’t understand it if He explained it to you.  [laughter]… I mean you wouldn’t explain it, I mean you can’t explain it, nor can you understand it.  When are you going to realize there’s some things that are bigger, too big for you.  [amen] 

   

  I mean, you know, there’s all of us running around with the brain being….how much does a brain weigh Dr. Ed?  [depends on whose brain you are talking about]  [laughter]  I think a brain only weighs a pound or so.  [comments]  You sure about that?  You think?  Ok, my secretary, she knows everything, so it’s 2 pounds.  But, if all of us are walking around with 2 pound brains, why do you think that you should be the exception to the rule that your brain should be able to understand the cosmos when no one’s been able to figure that out?  We’re just getting bits and pieces.  And the reason we have bits and pieces is because we cannot contain all of God in our little pea brains.  [amen]  We cannot. 

   

  So if we can accept that fact, here’s what it does tell us.  That we can contain what He tells us.  He tells us that, “In the beginning was the Word.”  And that Word that is in the Greek is the “Logos.”  Meaning He’s talking about a divine being that is not described here, that is with God, to the point that it is described as God….To the point that this thing, called the Word, everything is created… by Him.   Everything that is created  came through Him in order to be created….Alright?  So, what do we have?  Whenever the beginning began, whatever it was that declared it was a beginning, He was already there.  [amen]  He was already at the beginning, when the beginning began, whenever the beginning began, He was already there when it began.  In other words, when it started, He was already there before the start,khew a gun went off and everyone entered into the beginning.  He was there in the beginning,  before the beginning began, He was there.  Not only was He there, but He was there with God, who has no beginning and has no end, therefore, the Word had no beginning, had no ending, because it was there before the beginning with God, when it all began, whether it began or not, and if it had chose not to begin, He was still there.  [amen]…  Well, praise God.  [whew]  It’s all about Him…  [amen]  It’s all about Him. 

   

  And then it says, that when this beginning began, He was the one that began it.  [alright]  Lord have mercy.  Does everybody get the beginning of that?  [laughter]  The beginning of that is that when everything began, all things were made through Him, when He started the beginning, everything was made through Him.  And without Him,… nothing … was made.

   

  They got a group of scientists together and they were debating that they were finally as great as God.  And so, God says, “Ok, well you go first. You know, prove you’re God.”  And so the scientist says, “Well,” he says, “all life sprang from some amino acids.” And so he grabbed some amino acids.  And then he says, “Those amino acids were exposed to great power and great light.”  So he grabbed some light and some power and the amino acids and he’s going to, you know… and God said, “Whoa, yo, time out.”  He says, “You can’t create life. You got to do it the way I did it.”  And the scientist said, “How’d you do it?”  He said, “From nothing.  I took nothing and did it.”  So God reached over and took back the amino acids and everything else. 

   

  You see, what we have to realize is that Pharaoh had great magicians.  They could do great stuff.  And Pharaoh’s magicians were challenging everything that Moses said and everything that Moses did.  Until finally, all out of the mid air, God created the, the plague of gnats and flies.  Just out of the air, poof.  There’s gnats and flies and they’re on anything and everything and just gobbling it up.  The magicians dropped their stuff and went to Pharaoh and said, “We can’t do nothing.”  He says, “Why?”  He says, because, “We can create, we can make frogs jump around and we can take a stick and turn it into a snake.”  He says, “But only God,”  The Pharaoh’s magician said, “But only God can create something…from nothing.”  [yeah] 

   

  Now we have to ask ourselves, if we want to understand Him and everything’s about Him, how did everything come through Him?  His name is, what?  [the Word]  Come on, I didn’t get that deep.  The Word!  Can you say the [Word].  The Word.  If we can figure that out, we can begin to understand how He created everything.  Go to Romans, Chapter 4….Come on, say praise the Lord when you get there.  [Praise the Lord]  Romans Chapter 4, in verse 17  God says an amazing thing.  “…(as it is written, “I have made you a father of many nations”)”  He’s talking to Abraham, who has no kids.  The dude is old.  I mean old.  He’s older than me.  Alright?  So, God says, “…in the presence of Him whom he believed…”  In other words, Abraham believed what God had to say.  And it says, “God…”  Let’s read it together, come on, “who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did;”  One more time, “…God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did;”  In other words, God has this ability…to speak something into existence that was not there before…God calls those things which be not as though they were.  In other words, He calls things into existence just by speaking, but watch this, in His speaking He adds faith to it.  [right] 

   

  I always give this example cause it’s so true.  A father who looks at his little boy when he’s two and says, “I didn’t want you. Your momma didn’t want you.  You’re never going to grow up to be anything.  And, you just ain’t no good.”  If he persists in saying that to the 2 year old, as the 2 year old grows, he will hear the constant reverberation of his father calling into existence his worthylessness.  Is there such a word, Sister Joy?  Worthylessness? [no]  Good, praise God, I just called it into existence!  [laughter]  That word now exists.  Worthylessness.  He will call him and he’ll say that to him.  He’ll say that to him when he’s seven, flunking in school.  He’ll say it to him when he’s 12 or 13, can’t hit the ball in little league.  He’s beginning now to smoke, drink, and play the outer limits of the cultural existence, and by the time he’s 17, visiting him in jail and saying, “See, I told you.”  [right, right, right]  “You’re no good.”  The father is calling it into existence by speaking it. 

   

  There’s only one thing that can put a stop to it, praise God.  One thing.  I’ll tell  you…Cause you might call it wrong.  The only thing that can stop it is if the words that the boy speaks concerning himself override what daddy was calling him.  [amen]  Because his words are powerful too.  So if the little boy is going, he’s five years old, and his daddy says, “You no good,”  and in his mind he’s going, “That’s not true….I’m going to do great things.”  [hallelujah]  “And you ain’t getting any of the credit.”  [laughter] 

   

  We have the ability to call things which are not.  A sick person can call himself well and become the wellness of God.  A broken home can become healed because they spoke it.  They began to change what they say.  A husband that, that is no good and trifling, can be turned into a prince and a king, because someone spoke a different word over him.  [amen]  Lord have mercy.  God calls those things which be not, as though they were. 

   

  Let’s go to Genesis, Chapter 1.  Can you find that?  [yeah]  Anybody find Genesis, Chapter 1?  [amen]  We’re going back to the beginning.  In Genesis Chapter 1, the secret of what I’m trying to minister to you is revealed.  It says, verse 1, “In the beginning” who? [God] created what? [the heavens and the earth.] “heavens and the earth.”  Well, the question is, God, how did you do it?  I think that’s a fair question.  I think that’s a fair question to say, how did God create the universe and everything in it?  How did He do that?  Verse 3 tells us.  “Then God… said…”  Verse 6, “Then God said…” [said]  And verse 8 “And God called....”  Verse 9  “Then God said“  Verse 10 “And God called…”  Verse 11 “Then God said…”  Verse 14 “Then God said…” … Well, let me ask you then.  Go to verse 20  “Then God said…”  Look at verse 22, watch what He does here.  “And God blessed them, saying.…”  How did He bless them?  [saying]  Saying.  Lord have mercy! 

   

  Anybody here ever raise a daughter?  [yep] You know, I never had to do that.  My heart breaks for you.  [laughter]  I’m beginning to realize that probably the hardest thing in the world to raise besides chickens is girls.  [laughter]  Chickens are easy, right?  You just put them in the yard.  They find something to eat.  Right?  And then, then you cook them up and they taste good.  You know.  But listen to me carefully.  Listen to me carefully.  When you raise a girl a funny thing happens around 13, 14 years old…It starts talking back.  [laughter]  It starts earlier than that?  Oh, that’s right, I’m old school.  I’m old school.  It used to be 13, 14 that they start, now I guess it’s 9, 10, or 7 around like that.  You know.  And so, what you have upon your hands is this, everything that mom is trying to bless and speak into the child, the child contradicts and negates the blessing.  Lord have mercy.  Come on now.  [yeah]  Ok, moving right along.  Does anybody understand what I’m saying?  You’re speaking the blessing, and then they contradict. And so then what happens is momma gets tired of speaking the blessing and begins to speak the curse.  [oh]  Then she begins to agree with it. 

   

  We can do the same thing with a son.  But the dynamic is a little bit different.  The son will just listen, and as he listens, and he listens, and he listens, and he listens, and then when he thinks he has enough strength, he then tells you what you taught him.  He just saves it up.  The girl, she starts giving you feedback right away.  But the boy just saves it up.  And then at 16, at 16 you get your first volley of, your mouth has caused me to lose respect in you…Because why?  The whole time I’m becoming what you say, a part of me wants to reject that…

   

  Because why?  Words are powerful.  When God made us in His image, how did He do it?  He said, “I will give you the ability to have God-ness.”  Well, what’s God-ness?  I will give you the ability to speak as God. And how does God speak?  He calls those things which be not into existence.  You call them into existence.  The ability of God.  The Word, the Logos.  The Logos spoke it and it was so.  [hmmm]  He just spoke it.  He said, “I got a great idea cooking up in my mind, moon and stars.”  Phump  [yeah]… But in the perfectness of His mind, listen to me, in the perfectness of his mind, he had already calculated the exact distances of all the stars, because if you altered any one of them, none of you would be sitting here.  [amen]  If any of the planets, moons, and stars were one degree off, life on this earth would not be possible.  One degree.  One degree.  If the cosmos wasn’t exactly where it is, there’d be no life on this planet.  It would either be too hot or too cold.  We’re beginning to see that now with climatic change.  Just a slightest adjustment, and everything that was perfect is no longer perfect.  When God said it, not only did He say it, but He said it with perfect understanding and perfect design. 

   

  How are you all doing?  Wave at me if you’re still awake.  It’s all about You, Jesus.  It’s all about Him.  It’s all about Him because He spoke it into existence and then He says to them, in verse 26.  “…Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”  What has He done?  He has just said that we, by our speaking, come into dominion.  And how do we have dominion?  The same way He had dominion.  What battle was lost in the Garden of Eden?  The battle of Words…  Lord have mercy.  Husbands, you don’t want to lose that…  Moving right along.  [laughter]  And so, in verse 27, it says, “So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”  Then it says, “…God blessed them, and God… [said]  He did what?  [said]  Verse 29.  “And God...” what?  [said]  The beautiful thing is verse 31.  “Then God saw everything that He had made…”  How did He make it?  He spoke it into existence.  He had faith for it and He spoke it…And so, God spoke it into existence.  He said so. 

   

  The reason that it’s all about Him is because when He said so, and it came into existence, a process was set in motion that had to be fulfilled according to what He said.  Let’s go to Colossians, see if you can find Colossians…  Praise God…. I feel sorry for those of you that don’t want it to be all about Him.  You’d really rather it was all about you.  But the reality is that the guy that wrote the song, that it’s all about You, he was correct.  And it was scriptural.  And I’m going to give you some of the verses. 

   

  In Colossians 1, verse 9, “For this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with…”  what “…the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding;”  And the reason is because wisdom and spiritual understanding don’t come from you.  They only come from Him.  He is the source of wisdom and spiritual understanding.  “…that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing...” who?  [Him]  “Him.” 

   

  When you pleased yourself in life it resulted in a disaster.  It shows you to pick the wrong women.  It shows you to pick the wrong guy.  It shows you to pick the wrong job.  Pick the wrong car, pick the wrong financial plan.  When you chose to please yourself, you got drunk.  You got stupid.  You made mistakes.  Therefore, it’s all about Him and choosing what He wants, and doing it His way.  [amen] 

   

  Can you move on a little further?  “…strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power…” I can remember when I decided I was through with drugs on all levels…And I tried to stop other times.  And I realized I needed some help.  And I just said, “Lord, Lord, if you have the power to make me aware that it’s time for me to stop, then you are going to have to give me the supernatural power to do it.”  All of a sudden, something dropped in on here, something dropped in on here.  And there was a peace and understanding, watch this now, that I could say no to anything that didn’t please Him.  [amen]…  I’ll leave that for you to think about. 

   

  Moving right along.  Verse 12.  “…giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light.”  Well, what is the inheritance of the saints?  The inheritance of the saints isn’t that you’re going to get everything that you want.  The inheritance of the saints is, you will have everything that He wants for you that’s good for you.  [amen]  Cause, see, He can give it, but He sure can take it away.  Moving right along.  And He says, verse 13, lets read it with me, come on, please.  “He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have…” come on, “redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.”  Wait a minute.  Through His blood.  It is all about Him.  And the reason it’s all about Him is you can’t save yourself.  [that's true]  You can’t save yourself.  You can’t arrive in a position where you have the peace and the security to know that you’re there.”…

   

  • 9:24 pm
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