Experiencing God: Week 5

It's so good to see you this Morning's so good

to be in the House of the Lord today and

to be able to be a community and worship our God.

If you've noticed, we've been in a series Experiencing God,

and many of you have signed up for small groups,

some of you have just been reading the book on

your own, and it's just been a journey the last

several weeks. This is the fifth installment of this series,

and I'm just super excited to be able to share

with you this morning, and so let us pray and

let's jump into the word today. God, we thank you,

We thank you for who you are, thank you for

your presence and Lord, just like this series, Lord, we

want to experience you. We don't come to church for habit,

just for form or fashion, but we want to encounter You.

Want to see your markings in the earth through us.

So Holy Spirit, come now, speak, say whatever you want

to say, do whatever you want to do. Gain the

glory out of this moment. We pray this now in

Jesus' name. Amen. Hi, I am Pastor Mike if you

haven't met me yet, and I'm so glad to be

here this morning. Last week, Pastor Andrew appreached a very

riveting message about faith that challenged us to really consider

how faith works. And when we become people of faith,

we move from just having faith to actually step into

these spaces where we truly experience God. And so today,

in this fifth week, we want to talk about these

two terms that are melted together, and that is faith

that adjust and obeys, faith that adjust and obeys. So

I don't know if you have been reading the book

or not, but Henry mcabee says this one line that

is so powerful. Not that was the only line he said,

but this is one of the lines that he said.

It was so powerful. You cannot stay where you are

and go with God. Many of us, if we would

be honest, we are just looking for something that works

day after day. We don't want to shift too much,

we don't want too much chaos, we don't want to

not know what's next. And so he challenges us to

go with God. We're going to have to move. And

moving is not always moving to another city a new state.

It doesn't mean that you need to move jobs. It

may not mean those things. It might just be moving

a mindset. But when God invites us, when he extends

the invitation. Adjustments are required. When God sends an invitation,

you're going to have to make some adjustments in your

life in order to fulfill the invitation. You remember the

story of the wedding and the parable of the wedding,

and the invitations are set out and someone comes in

and they're not prepared for the wedding. I want to

let you know that there are some adjustments that are required.

Adjustments test our trust. If we are going to be

people of God who say we believe in God, we

trust in God, then guess what the adjustments come along

with the trust. Because I trust you so much, I

don't mind adjusting most of the things that I like,

we have to adjust for. Have you ever been in

a wedding before? Now, I don't know about you guys,

but the old school weddings, I mean you would get

a fitting, then you would go back for another fitting

because it may fit or may not fit. Then they

had to either take it out or take it in.

Most times take it out if it was my case.

But you understand what I'm saying. There's changes that happens

all the time, so you have to make adjustments. And

the Lord is calling for us often to adjust. Consider Abraham,

if you would. Abraham couldn't experience God's promise until he

left where he was, until he left the familiar, and

until he left everything that he had known his whole life.

Look with me, if you would. To Genesis twelve one

through four, the Bible says this, and listen, as believers listen,

I'm being honest with you. I wanted to this to

be my license plate, like the you know, personalized Genesis twelve,

and I actually went verse three, but it's already taken.

Who's got it anyway, because it's such a great line.

But there's a whole lot of things that comes before that.

This is what the Bible says. The Lord said to Abram,

go from your country, your people, and your father's household

to the land I will show you. I'm not even

telling you where you're going. Just go, Just go. Could

you imagine how arkward that could have been? Just go

to the place I'm showing. I will show you where

you're going, but go first. So then he says this.

He says, I will make you into a great nation,

and I will bless you. I will make your name great,

and you will be a blessing. I will bless those

who bless you, and whoever curses you, I will curse,

and all the people's on earth will be blessed through you.

Check that he gives him an assignment that everyone is

going to be blessed because of him, but it was

all depending upon him going to the place he didn't

even know he was going. Then it goes like this,

and I love this, So Abram win crazy. Abram is crazy,

crazy for God, crazy for the encounter he had with

the Lord. He hears the voice of God and he

responds and he says, as the Lord had told him,

and Lot went with him. Now that's a whole nother

story we can talk about another day. But Abram was

seventy five years old when he set out for Haraan.

So I want to us pause there for a minute,

and I want to say to some of you in

this room, seventy five years old too old. No. I

know you're tired, and you might be tired, but the

Lord still calls for those who are seventy five plus

to go for him. God is still calling you the

rest of your life. God is going to be calling

for you to make some adjustments, to make some changes.

I know you want to ride it out and your

sunset years and just pop out to Florida every winter.

But guess what, I know some people are like they

already left anyway, if you're watching go online this morning.

But even in those spaces, God can use you. Wherever

you go. God is calling for you to adjust, to

make some adjustments, to do something for His glory, for

his honor. Amen. Check this out. Faith turns disruption into direction.

Most of us in our lives, you will come to

a place where you just feel disrupted, disturbed, things are

not going smooth. And I want to let you know

that often when that happens in your life, that is

the Lord trying to direct you somewhere. I remember when

my wife and I we had first got married, in

our early years of marriage, I was in ministry, loving ministry,

working doing all these things, and there came a time

where I just felt just I didn't feel like things

were smooth. I felt disturbed, I felt disrupted. It was

an internal disruption and I didn't know what was wrong.

I didn't know what was going on, but I knew

something was off. And so there was this weekend, the

Monday we had off and I stayed home. My wife

had went to work, and I'm at home and I'm praying.

I am praying. But after I was praying, the Lord

said something that sounded a little strange to me, very

strange to me, because when I first met my wife,

when we were just friends, just hanging out, I came

and visited her in Anderson. My wife is from Indiana.

I got to tell everybody that because they was like, oh,

how do you like Indiana. Well, she knows Indiana. She's

been her whole life. She was born in Anderson, right,

And so when I came to visit her in Anderson,

I came and I said, I will never live here.

I've told that lie three times now, and so I

knew this was strange. But when I was in prayer,

the Lord was saying, to me, go to Anderson University

in the state of Indiana. There is one in South Carolina.

I didn't even realize that that clarity makes a difference. Amen,

And so he says that I talked to my wife

about it. We have this conversation. She's like, what She

wasn't ready to come back, but we were in a

place that we had to be obedient to the Lord.

We felt that, we felt God saying, hey, you gotta go.

So we made some adjustments. And the adjustments was picking

up everything. We didn't have much with it, just gotten married,

you know how it is. When we first started out,

we got a bunch of stuff, now more stuff than

we want. So we picked up everything, threw it all

in the U haul, and we made our way to Indiana.

There's a long testimony story in there. I don't have

enough time to tell it all, but one day, if

you catch me on the side and we got I'll

tell you we obeyed what God was asking us to do.

When I got to Anderson, I went up to the

school and I was like, okay, I'm here to sign

up for school and I'm ready to take classes. And

we went over the courses and everything, and then we

went over the financial bill and I said, God, you

tricked me. Can't afford to go here. But He had

me in the city and the state He wanted me.

He knew the language, go to the place. I will

show you. Little did I know that eight years later

I would actually graduate from Anderson University. But it was

on his timing. God is calling for some adjustments. There

are five types of adjustments that God calls for. One

may be a spiritual adjustment. Maybe God is calling you

to pray more. Maybe he's calling you to fast, Maybe

he's calling you through repentance. Maybe he's calling you to

surrender something to him, to let go something. There might

be a relational adjustment that you need to make. Maybe

you need to forgive somebody. Maybe there's somebody you've been

holding on to that thing too long and you need

to forgive them. You need to be reconciled to them.

Maybe someone in your family, maybe someone in your past.

Maybe it's someone at the church. You ever seen two

people who you know they don't really click too well

at church. Not at church, definitely not here. But maybe

reconciliation is something that we need. Or maybe you just

need to let go of the wrong influences. Maybe there's

some people you actually need to let go of because

they're influencing you the wrong way. And I know it's

so hard because as believers, the thing we need to

bring everybody in and love everybody and spend time with everybody.

But no, you need to get the direction of the

Lord about the relationships that you have, because if someone's

going the wrong direction and you're trying to go the

right direction. You might have to let them go. Pray

for him, but let him go. Oh that's helping somebody today.

Pray for them, but let them go. God can take

care of them. Maybe there's a financial adjustment you need

to make. Maybe God is calling you to give, and

I want to let you know giving is powerful. I

know a lot of times in these days and times,

we don't have a whole lot, but I want to

let you know. If God is calling you to give,

He's already provided the gift. I'll say that again. If

God is calling you to give, He's already provided the gift.

If you release the gift, God is already ready to

bless you. I remember one time my wife and I

were the Lord was talking to us about blessing some one,

and when I told my wife, she was like, huh,

And I say, yeah, that's crazy, right, I'm crazy, right,

I'm crazy. But as soon as we release that gift,

I'm telling you that the Lord not only blessed us

back with that, but he multiplied it. Oh. I don't

mind giving, I don't mind being a condoing because you

can't beat God's giving. Maybe God is calling for you

to make a career or calling adjustment. Maybe God has

been talking to you about leaving that job for a

long time, but you keep praying about it. He's been

telling you to go back to school, and you keep

praying about it. It's funny when we pray about things

and God answers us, but we just don't listen. Like Lord,

I'm just gonna keep praying about it. Yes, go back

to school. I'm just gonna pray about that some more.

Oh no, no, go ahead, and you shall apply for

this job over here. I'm just gonna pray about that. Listen.

Just do it. Mikey had it right, Just do it.

If the Lord is speaking to you, just do what

he is saying. Step into the unknown for God's kingdom purpose.

Let me help somebody there too. Listen. When God gives

you the job, when you get to the school, don't

forget who sent you. Oh yeah, let me talk to y'all.

Y'all listening. If God bless you with the job, he

sent you there to be a representative. He didn't send

you there for a paycheck. Oh get the praycheck. Please

get the paycheck. Amen. We want you to pay the bills. Amen,

but don't forget why and who you are there for

that the Lord has called you to be an ambassador

in that space that He's called you to be light

and darkness. He's called you to be sought where there

isn't any salt, no flavor. No, He's called you to

be Him in those spaces. And finally, there might be

an emotional adjustment that we need to make. Listen, if

we are really honest, all of us have been through

some type of trauma, just reality. We didn't have a

term for it, like about twenty years ago, maybe twenty

five years ago, because trauma like well, somebody said trauma.

I was like, whooh, that sounds horrible. Who was an

accident because it sounds like a car accident. But some

of us have had some emotional car accidents, some car wrecks,

and there's some things that form from that, just like

in a physical accident. There's some soreness, there's some things.

On certain days when it rains, you feel the pains

of it. Emotionally, you can feel the same thing and

guess what, we have to turn those things over. The

medication works in physical situations, but in emotional situation We've

got to let the bitterness, the regret, the fear, the anxiety.

We need to release that to the Lord. It's not

yours to carry. He can handle it. Praise God. Each

adjustment is a declaration God, your will matters more than

my comfort. Every time I make an adjustment, I'm saying, Lord,

I want your will more than I want my own thing.

I want your will more than I want my own comfort.

I want your will more than I want my own way.

Consider Moses with if you would. Moses meets God and

he compromises his comfort in the desert to complete an

assignment that he did not want. He ran from Egypt.

He did not want to go back to Egypt. He

was chilling with his wife in the desert. But the

Lord calls him, and he says, go back. Is God

calling you to go back somewhere that was painful for you? Maybe,

But I want to let you know that when you

come out of that situation that he's calling you back from,

that you're coming back better than when you go in. Remember,

Moses was pulled. His name means drawn out of the water.

Check this out. His name means drawn out of the water.

But he goes back to Egypt, and he not only

draws is drawn out of the water, but he brings

all of God's people through the water. He was named

and destined to do that. What are you named and

destined to do? Faith fuels adjustments because we believe in God.

It makes us adjust. It's like, oh, I gotta get it,

I gotta do this, I gotta fix this, I gotta

change this. I gotta be open to God. It fuels

adjustments because Hebrews eleven six says this, Without faith, it's

impossible to please God. And we want to please God.

I want to please God. I want the Lord to

be happy with the results of my life. When it's

all said and done, I want to hear those words,

well done, thy good, and faithful. I had faith to believe,

and I follow through with my faith. We adjust because

we believe God's can is better than our own. I

know you made a good plan. You made a pain

free plan. I made a pain free plan. That's what

humans do. We don't want any stress, any trauma, any drama.

Some of you are planning a pain free Thanksgiving. That's

why you didn't invite your in laws. I'm only joking.

And some of you are like, no, he's not anyway.

But the reality is that when God is doing something,

his plan is better. Even when it's complicated. It's not

gonna be easy, it's not gonna be pain free, but

it's going to develop you. It's going to build you.

It's gonna make you into who God is calling you

to be for his glory. So this is how this

thing work. Belief drives obedience, and obedience confirms belief. So

in other words, we believe and we obey, and then

after we obey, we see that what we believe was true.

I'm gonna say that again. Somebody got lost. Try This

belief drives obedience, and obedience confirms belief. And so once

we step into it and we say I believe God,

and then God says do and you do. After you do,

then you say who it happened in work because I

believe God. It works in tandem, it works together. So

this is part two. Once we make the necessary adjustments,

the next step is to obey, because obedience is where

we experience God, and where we experience God for real.

You can make all the adjustments and never go. You

can pack for the trip, get the car off, set,

put all the bags in, get everything ready, pack the lunch.

But if you never take the drive, you just made

adjustments and God is getting us ready for a trip.

Lackabee says this too. Haha. More things he said that

was really good in this book. Obedience is the moment

when you actually experience God. Some of us have not

experienced God because we refuse to obey. To say yes

and do yes. Say yes and do yes, and you

will experience God. Could you imagine just first I do

think about Moses. Moses meets God, God tells him what

to do. He has the journey from the desert all

the way back to Egypt. Do you know how difficult

or what thoughts were going through his head from the

place he was until he He didn't get any results

until he saw the first plague really happening. There's gonna

come a time when you're doing a thing that God

has calling you to do that you don't know if

he's with you or not. Oh, that's gonna help somebody today.

There's gonna come a time when you're doing a thing

that God is calling you to do and you're not

gonna know if he's with you or not. It's not

gonna be until you're in the place of full obedience

and surrender. I am here now, Lord, I eat me

on this stage this morning. I'm here now. You gotta

do something. Lord. Somebody says, Mike, don't you just love

this stage? No, I don't. You don't see me fifteen

minutes before I walk out here because I realize the

weight of preaching the gospel, that somebody's soul is waiting

to hear a word that will change your life forever.

So I'm back there trembling while other people are waiting.

What is he gonna say today? I don't know. Praise

the Lord. So when God speaks, our obedience reveals his purpose.

Obedience is love in action. You love God. If you

love God, you say you love God. Obey him. John

fourteen twenty one says this. It says, whoever has my commands,

has my commands, and keeps them, is one of who

loves me. The one who loves me will excuse me,

loves me, will be loved by my father, and I

too will love them and show myself to them. You

want to see God, obey him. Obedience isn't our duty,

it's our devotion. It comes out of devotion. Lord, because

I love you. If you're doing it out of duty,

I want to let you know there is a breach

in your relationship. It's not about duty, it's about devotion. Lord.

I love you so much. I'll do whatever you want

me to do. I'll go wherever you want me to go.

I'll say whatever you want me to say. Lord, use me.

I am available to you. This is a heart that

is devoted to the Lord, deeply devoted. There's something that's

so sterile about duty. Well, I took the kids to

school because it's my duty. I paid the bills because

that's my duty. It's missing something. But when someone is

devoted to the Lord, everything changes because your focus is

about him getting the glory, about loving him. God reveals

himself through our obedience, not our discussion. I want to

let you know we got to stop talking it. God

help me. I'm always talking it right. You know, when

the proof is in the pudding is when you have

to walk it, when you got to actually live the

word that you say. Sometimes I don't even like to

preacharch messages because I said, I'm not in that season

right now. But Lord, what will the Lord ask me

to do next? You know? What This message is real

for me because I'm living it. Hello, I live right

down the street, y'all. I'm not getting on a plane

this afternoon to go back to Virginia. There were some

adjustments that had to be made. There was a house

that needed to be bought. Oh, Lord, have mercy. There

was a house that needed to be sold, and now

we're in the thick of it. If you want to

experience God, you must adjust and you must obey. Usually

when you want to obey God, there are five barriers

that will try to block your obedience. I'm gonna give

you the five. I'm just gonna call them out so

we don't have to like fake like they don't exist.

Number one fear. Fear will try to block your obedience.

Afraid to do it. You don't want to be you

don't want to fail, and you don't want people to

reject you. They're gonna come times we God is gonna

ask you to pray for somebody to be present with

somebody to talk, speak his name, his his worth in

the earth, and you might be afraid obey. We don't

have control. This is another thing that blocks obedience. I

don't have control of this. I can't control this. We

control everything, like I know right now, I got eleven

minutes and seven seconds. Now God might take twelve and

that's all right because he's in control. Amen. And maybe

it only take nine minutes to get this finished. Amen.

But we want all of the control factors, and God

is saying you can't have control because control stops you.

I'm obeying. We miss things when we want to be

in control. A third is pride. I'm too prideful. That

doesn't look like me. I don't want people to think

these things of me. I don't want them to feel

certain ways about me. If I do these things that

God is asking me to do. Get rid of your pride,

obey doubt. You're questioning God, this is crazy? Is that

really you? This is usually the one I struggle with

the most. Is that really you? And I've learned over

time just do what he's saying. You know his voice

by now, and it ain't like you met him yesterday.

And then there is the delay, the delay to obeying,

procrastinating obedience, pretending to wait for confirmation. If I can

just get five more people to say, this is the

will of the Lord, listen, nobody's coming. When Oh, thank

you Jesus. When God speaks, he doesn't need confirmation. When

God says a word, he doesn't need to be confirmed.

His word is enough. Confirmation is for you, not for God.

Delayed obedience is still disobedience disguised. I'm gonna say that

again because somebody needs to suck that in today. Delayed

obedience is still disobedience in disguise. What is the Lord

telling you to do? What has he been telling you

to do? What has he been speaking to you about? Secondly,

partial obedience is still disobedien. Well, the Lord told me

to give, and I gave. But what did he tell

you to give? Did you give it all? Or did

you give a portion? If he gave you something to give?

If it was like, go and spend a week with

your parents, go and spend a week with your parents.

Don't spend three days and a half because you're gonna

miss the blessing. The blessing is probably gonna happen on

the sixth day. Give what he says, give, oh bang,

don't be a partial partial obedience. The Bible says this

in Hebrews Hebrews eleven. Now faith is a substance of

things hope for the evidence of things not seen. The

Good News Bible says that faith is sure and certain.

Sure and certain.

That means even when I first hear I know if

it's God. There is a surety, and there is certain

that whatever God has spoken is going to happen.

I don't have to worry about it. Listen. It comes

back to the first thing. Faith. All of this works

together because if we have faith, we must adjust, and

if we adjust, we need to obey. It's working together. Now. Listen,

let me give you some rewards for adjusting and obeying,

or let me give you some people so you can

understand what can happen with you or to you when

you adjust and obey. Moses redeemed not only his story,

but he redeemed God's people story because he adjusted and obeyed.

Abraham experienced God's covenant even after once he adjusted and

went through the season and got to the place that

God was showing him. He experienced God's covenant because he

adjusted and obeyed. Peter experienced God's power when he obeyed

and put his net back in the water one more

time after he had fished all night in Looke viv.

He experienced the power of God. Because he adjusted what

he knew and obeyed, the disciples experienced God's presence after

leaving everything they had to follow Jesus. Any time anyone

encounters God and they decide to adjust and obey, guess

what Something's gonna happen. When you adjust, God aligns your

life with his purpose. When you obey, God reveals him

self through your life. When both happened together, the adjustment

and the obedience together, you experienced God in ways you

could have never imagined. I have story upon story upon

story upon story. God is waiting for you. Sometimes we say, Lord,

I'm waiting on you. I'm waiting on the Lord. I'm

waiting on the Lord. I'm waiting on the Lord. No, no, no, no,

God is waiting on you. Often, when I'm having a

conversation with someone, say I had recently a conversation with someone.

They said, I feel like the Lord has abandoned me.

He's left me. He hasn't he isn't talking to me,

he isn't saying anything to me. And then and then

they said, I'm thinking a Lord about this thing. And

I asked him this question. I said, what was the

last thing God asked you to do. God is waiting

on you. You are not waiting on God. So I gave

you all of the what now I want to give

you some hows. Well, Pastor Mike, you told me I

need to adjust. You told me I need to obey

because this connects to my faith. Well, guess what? How

do you do it? First? Ask God? Where are you

inviting me to join you right now? Where do you

want me to be? What do you want me to do? Lord?

What is it you want of me? To identify the

adjustments that will need to take place in order for

you to follow three act in obedience, the simple small things.

Just do it. It sounds crazy and small. Let this

person go first in the line. You don't know why

I'm in a rush. Lord, go ahead, simple obedience. And then, also,

once you know what the Lord is directing you to do, accountability,

bring somebody in with you. Have them join you in

the journey so that when you want a falter, they

remind you. No, God said you can do it. You

can make it. You can because He is there. Listen.

Faith that never adjust is just belief. I know a

lot of people who believe in God, but they don't

have faith in God. Faith that adjusts but never obeys

is just good intentions. And somebody wrote something that says,

the road somewhere is paid with that. But faith that

adjust and obeys, that's where you experience the true and

living God. Reality is God is waiting for you, and

someone else is waiting for you too. The reality is

that everybody who ever encountered the Lord, it was always

tied to other people. It was never just about them.

So I want to let you know your assignment is

so important because when you are just when you obey,

it's going to impact people around you. They are waiting

for you to obey God. Finally, just the other week,

we were having community here at the church and I

was serving communion and backstage I was preparing, but meanwhile

my mind was full because one of my best friends,

one of my best friends in the world, was in

the hospital and here in the city and calling my

brother in. He was not doing well, unresponsive, he wasn't eating,

and he's had a condition that has spanned it like

fifteen twenty years, and so we were so worried. But

we were serving communion and I looked at my wife

and I said, I feel like we need to go

and take him communion and it felt awkward to me.

So I was kind of waiting for it's like some

kind of confirmation. And she was like, she said hmm,

and she says, she said, well, we don't want to

create that environment where it kind of feels like we're

given last rites or something like that. And I said, yeah,

I don't want to make really do that either. But

he hasn't eaten in days and just felt was feeling that.

So we got in our car and we went on

to the hospital and after serving communion and get in

the room and he's not really responsible. I've never had

seen him like this before. He's like kind of in

and out but not talking, not saying much at all.

And in my mind, I'm thinking, man, I wish we

had brought communion. And then my wife slides over to

my hand and she opens her hand and she has

the communion cups. And I said, WHOA, okay, God, And

so he had it eaten for three days, and on

this day we brought communion. He took communion, he took

the bread, he took the cup that's represented of the

blood of Jesus, and he consumed it. We sang and

we sang his favorite song, and interestingly enough, his favorite

song is trust and obey, because there's no other way

to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey.

And for the purposes of this service, I wanted to

say adjustin obey, but I knew some saints would get

me out of the service. But later that evening we received

a video message of him sitting up in the bed

and eating. His daughter was feeding him. Now, I don't

know if it was a communion that was a miracle,

or it was the obedience. I'm betting on obedience. Yesterday

evening they both sat in our living room and we

laughed and went back in time. His wife said this,

She said, we rehearsed that story, and she said, the

one thing I'm mostly excited about there is a witness,

because we got to witness what God can do. Stand

on your feet this morning. What is God calling you

to do? Where is God asking you to adjust? And

what obedience will that require? Obedience? Who thank you Jesus.

It's hard, but the rewards to obedience are so wonderful.

Trust him and obey him. Let us pray Father, I

thank you in the name of Jesus. I thank you

for who you are. I thank you, Lord God, that

you don't give up on us, Oh God. Some of

us in this room you've been calling us for months,

some for years, Lord God, to do that thing, Oh God.

And Lord, we keep throwing it off us prayer, Oh God,

we keep delaying it, Oh God. But today we heard

a word, and Lord God, we will not walk in

disobedience any longer. God, we will adjust whatever that means.

And God, we will obey, for we trust you enough

and we have faith to believe that if you say

a thing, you will follow through with it. Help us

today to surrender and to give it all over to you,

for you are worthy of it, all for your glory

and your honor and Jesus' name. Let everybody say Amen

and Amen,