School House - Week 1

We're starting a brand new series today called Schoolhouse, and

we want to talk about kind of, I guess more

the academic side of discipleship. You know, we really believe

that the thrust, the major part of discipleship is service.

It's being hands on and seeing God work through the

things that we do, the things that we put our

hands on. The Word says, don't just be hearers, but

be doers of the Word. Also, discipleship is not just academic. Amen.

We went through a we went through an age in

the church where discipleship was all about sitting in a

classroom and learning, and as a result, we really did

lose influence in our local communities because we got so

busy just trying to figure things out that we didn't

do anything. Amen. And even though we believe the thrust

of discipleship is in so servis, there is also we

need to understand what we should learn and how we

do learn in order to maximize our benefit to the

Kingdom of God. Amen. Why, I mean, you know, why

is knowing the Word of God even imported? I guess

that's the question that I want to answer today, is

why is it even imported? Because up until this point,

a lot of people have gotten by in their spiritual

walk spending very little time with God's word. I mean,

after all, you know, pretty much the church has become

kind of the do all fix, all right, if you

have a problem, you just come and there's somebody that

can help guide you through it. But what if there

was ever a time where you didn't have access to that?

What if there was a time where we didn't have

the ready access that we have to church and all

of the resources that the church has, and we just

needed to know these things and have these things in

our heart. Are we equipped to God our children without

outside inputs? Are we equipped to God ourselves without outside inputs?

And that is our personal responsibility to learn the word

of God and to know the Word of God. Hebrews

chapter eleven. If you've got a Bible, go to Hebrews

chapter eleven. Hebrews chapter eleven. We're going to start in

verse one. If you're there, say amen, everybody else, look

at the screen. Hebrews chapter eleven, Verse one. It says, now, faith,

Let's just try to say faith. Now, that's all I

want you to say. Don't keep repeating after me, Okay,

just that one words all I wanted. Now. Faith is

the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things

not seen. For byath. The elders obtained a good testimony

by faith. We understand that the worlds were framed by

the word of God, so that the things which are

seen were not made of things which are visible. Father,

we thank you for your word. It's the only change

agent we have on the face of this planet. And

I pray today that it takes residents down deep the

very fabric of our being and then it brings a harvest,

harvest of life and vitality and purpose. Lord, that you

would truly change us today in Jesus' name. Amen. You know, uh,

this whole idea of the world being framed by the

word of God, there's a lot of different understandings of frames.

And when we talk about this framing of the world

by the word of God, literally there is a set

of natural laws and there's a set of spiritual laws

that are at work all the time. God created the earth.

He created the earth perfect. He did it, He did

it absolutely perfect for us to live in in the

earth suit that we have right now. God created certain

things for us to exist in our fleshly form, but

I want you to know you're more than flesh and blood. Somebody,

at least somebody should have said amen. Let they just

pretend like I didn't hear that. Let me say, well,

you're more than flesh and blood. There is a deep

seated purpose down at the spirit level of who you are,

that part that the moment you trusted Jesus that he

saved you, and he quickened it and he brought it

to life, that thing that exploded on the inside of you,

and you just somehow tapped into an unknown purpose and

potential that you didn't even know was there. The spirit

part of who we are, and that spirit part is

fed not by the worldly systems but by the spiritual systems,

and many times the spiritual systems stand in opposition to

the natural systems, because that is what faith is. Faith

is standing and understanding that natural things may say this,

but spiritual things say this, and then God looks and says,

which are you gonna believe? Every single day we see,

we see, and we are fed and we ingest worldly systems.

We learn those things, we see those things, we experience

those things, and if we don't do is equal, If

we don't get as much word that equals out what

we get in the worldly system. We start tilting towards

living according to the worldly system. The moment you're saved,

you're no longer even a citizen of Earth. You're a

citizen of God's kingdom, which is completely governed by spiritual laws.

And we find those spiritual laws in God's Word. That's

where we find those things. So if we want to

understand how Jesus walked on the water when gravity says

he can't do it, come on, somebody, when gravity says

you can't do that, but Jesus did it. Anyway, how

does that work? If we want to know how Peter,

how Philip can pray for the Ethiopian Unich and baptizing

and they're both teleported to a different place, because after

all of that only exists in Hollywood, right, Hollywood and scripture,

because there are spiritual laws that govern things that are

outside the natural world, and we find those things in

God's Word. And we must feed the supernatural, spiritual side

of who we are more than we feed ourselves with

the natural world. In Romans, chapter ten, verse sixteen, it says,

but they've not all obeyed the gospel for Isaiah says,

Lord who has believed our report. So then faith comes

by hearing and hearing the word of God. So faith

comes by hearing and hearing the word of God. Faith

is the currency of the kingdom. You've heard me say

that before. Faith is the currency of the kingdom. In

other words, there is an exchange that is made. Come on, somebody,

you know it works alongside, in a parallel to the

earthly system that if you have currency, I'm fixing stick

my hand in my pocket. I hope I have money.

I do. I was gonna have to borrow some you know, well,

this is not much money. It's twenty dollars. You know,

this used to buy a lot more than it buys now. Amen,

Now you can get half a happy meal with this.

So you can go to McDonald's. You can take this

twenty and you can exchange it for you know, a

small fry and an ice water. Right. And here's another

great thing about about faith. It's inflation proof. Do you know,

the same thing that faith moved back in the scriptures,

that's same amount of faith still does the same thing

today that even if you just can just get a

mustard seed worth of faith, that it can move a mountain,

and you exchange this for things, and faith works the

same way. Faith is that exchange. It's the ability to

go to God knowing that God is for you and

working on your behalf. And no matter how much the

enemy tries to deter you and steer you away, you're

able to stand fast because your faith has built strong.

And faith comes by hearing the word of God. Faith

doesn't come by you just deciding you need something. Faith

doesn't come just by you deciding that things are bad

and they need to be different. Faith hinges and is

built on God's word. The academic side of discipleship, we

think that faith is just a system of beliefs. But

faith is so much more than a system of belief.

Faith is deeper than just believing, or it would just

be called belief. Faith is contingent upon what we know

and our working knowledge, our ability to apply God's word

to our lives. It's not just reading it, it's not

just memorizing, but understanding how it applies to our lives.

It is application. Scripture is made not as a history lesson,

but as an application of the spiritual world lived out

in the natural world. Let me say that again. It

is an application of the spiritual world lived out in

the natural world. So you shouldn't look like everybody else.

Come on now, and I ain't talking about the way

you dress. I'm not talking about what listen. I'm not

talking about what's pierced. I'm not talking about what's tattooed.

I'm not talking about any of that. All that's irrelevant.

That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about you

shouldn't carry yourself and the things around you shouldn't happen

the way they happen with everybody else. When you walk

into a room, the environment of the room should change.

When you walk into a place, the spirit of God

begins to envelop and work in that place. But we've

been convinced that natural law trump's spiritual law because we

don't have a great understanding of faith and we don't

feed that faith system enough with God's word. Now, I

don't want you to leave here and allow the enemy

to beat you up every day and say, oh, well,

I don't read enough, I don't do this enough. Transparency

our foundational core principle. This may shock you, it may not.

I do not sit at a desk and read the

Bible for eight hours a day. I didn't expect you

to laugh that hard, Laura when I said that. I mean,

but you know, there's a whole lot more to ministry

than that, because remember, the academic side is this much.

In the service side, is that much of us becoming

a disciple. But we got to feed ourselves the Word

of God every day. The amount is contingent upon the

season in life you're in. You know, if you're a

if you're a mom and you got forty seven kids

and they and they got to be at school, and

they go to six different schools, and you got one

station wagon and you're stacking them eight deep. Right, you

have less time than Pastor Clay, who doesn't really do anything.

You got more time. I mean, Amber does everything for

Pastor Clay. So all he should do is just read

the Bible. That's all he needs to do. But when

we understand the season of life we're in, God sees

those seasons also. God sees those seasons also. God brings

those seasons, and he commits into us the responsibilities that

we can and should handle in those moments of life.

That's why, for the most part, you know, children are

born to people that have still a little energy and

stamina about them. Grandparents love kids and spoil kids because

they don't have them for more than twenty four hours

at a time. Grandparents are not exhausted by children, so

they have a different level of love and a different

level of connection with grandkids. It's seasons of life. But

here's the thing. Every single one one of us has

enough time to spend some time in God's Word. We

don't compare it to how much somebody else spends in

God's Word, but we all spend time in God's Word.

And there's a lot of different ways to spend time

in God's Word. There are those read through the Bible

and a year plans. How many of you have ever

seen that? How many of you ever attempted that? How

many of you ever succeeded? Every time I ask, hands

go down, because here's why happens. You hit one of

those seasons and you get behind, right, and if you

get behind, it's hard, it's hard to click off all

those little squares if you ever get behind, and then

the enemy gets involved and he says, oh, you're not

a good Christian. You can't even read through the Bible

in a year. I'm gonna give you some other information

that may shock you. Until I was probably thirty five

years old, I had only ever read one entire book

other than the Bible through in my life. One I'd

only read one book from beginning to end besides the Bible,

and that was Old Yeller. And if you could go

back and pull all of my school records from sixth

grade through twelfth grade, you would find out that every

book report I ever did was on Old Yeller. Everyone.

I would get to class. Sometimes I start my I

would start giving my oral presentation my book. When they

said that was not on the selected list of books,

I would say, I didn't know that. I thought it.

I thought this was all I mean, it's a really

good book. You don't want to hear about them. And

they said, okay, yeah, yeah, just go ahead, and I

just got by with it. It was God's favor, right.

I was not a big reader, and the enemy would

always convince me that I wasn't good I was pastoring,

and the enemy would convince me that I wasn't good

enough because I wasn't reading enough Bible every day. But

we only need to read the Word enough to invigorate

our spirit and to get a mastery of scripture. So

let me give you another method of reading the Bible

instead of trying to read quantity. How about incorporating it

with the discipline of meditation, where you take a block

of scripture that's manageable on a daily basis, and you

read it over and over and over and over again

until you get a mastery of that passage or that

portion of scripture. To me, when you do that, that

drops into your spirit instead of trying to check something off,

check a box off, then you're really getting into God's

word and it's becoming part of who you are. And

guess what. If I'm reading the same passage of scripture

every day for thirty days and I miss Tuesday, I'm

not behind because I'm reading the same thing tomorrow. Now,

If I'm reading the same passage scripture for thirty days

and I read it on day one and then I

read it again on day thirty, i am behind. Right.

So what season of life you're in will help you

determine the way you study God's word, and it will

also keep you from getting guilt from the enemy. But

faith is believing and standing on what God says. Let

me say that again. Faith is standing on what God says,

not just believing that things are going to be the

way that I want them to be. In First John

chapter five, verse one, it says, now, this is the

confidence that we have in him that if we ask

anything according to his will. Underline that according to his will,

he hears us. And if we know that he hears

us whatever we ask, we know that we have the

petitions that we have asked of him. He says, Listen,

when you ask according to my will, I'm going to

give it to you. When you ask according to my

will in faith, I'm going to give it to you.

But how do we know if we're asking according to

God's will God's word. We know God's will by studying

and knowing God's word. So we begin to ask things

according to scripture and lining up with scripture. And faith

is automatic because faith comes by hearing and hearing the

word of God. And if I'm praying God's word back

to him and I'm asking for things that's already in

alignment with his will, he can get me out of

the way and then it's just up to God. Many

times we pray for things that we want, and we

think that if we ask him enough. Like that four

year old that just keeps saying, popsycle, popsicle, popsicle, popsicle, popsicle.

You know what happens to that kid. They get a popsicle.

They may get spanks two or three times before, but

they end up with a popsicle. That doesn't work with God.

Faith is what moves the heart of God. God's not

moved by our situation. He's not moved by our circumstance.

He's not moved by the tragedy of the world. He's

moved by faith of the people of God. That's what

moves the heart of God. And the way our faith

grows is we know his word, and we understand his will,

and we come into alignment with His will. In Ephesians

chapter four, verse fourteen, it says that we should no

longer be children tossed to and fro carried about with

every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men and

the cunning craftiness of deceitful plot. But speaking the truth

and love may grow up in all things, and to

him who is the head Christ. He says it's time

for us to no longer be children, but to mature

and grow up so that out by, so that we're

not blown about by every wind of doctrine, by every

idea that we hear. Let me ask you a question.

How many of you, over the course of years you

have changed what you believe? Okay, why did you change

what you believe? Did somebody say it better than the

person you learned it from first? Did you have an

experience that maybe taught you differently than what you believed

in the beginning. You know, I didn't have a whole

lot of spiritual of spiritual foundation before I got to

em Manual College. I didn't go to church a whole

lot before I got to Emmanual College. So I kind

of jumped into I kind of jumped into Christianity, Pentecostalism

all at the same time. As a matter of fact,

my first experience was weird. It was weird. My first experience.

We went to what's called closed Weekend. It's like a revival,

and you just if you go to school there, you

just have to be there. And there was this guy there,

Danny Chambers, and he made an alter call and listen,

it was w I L. D. Wild. I mean, he

was bringing people up and standing him on the front

of the stage. He would back up and he would

say and that, like he was pulling out Holy Ghost

six shooter boom and blowing people off the front of

the stage. That And at one point there was a

girl down on her hands knees and he took his

jacket off. He was hitting her in the back and

he looked at he said, I'm gonna beat the Holy

Coostant to her. And at that point I still wasn't saved.

And at that point I ran out of the church.

I have a lot of testimonies of a man with

me leaving church. And I went back to the dorm

room and I called my mom collect because that's the

only way I could do it. And I said, woman,

you have dropped me off in a colt. I can

hear him coming for me. Come get me right now. Now,

listen to what I tagged on. There was this little

gazebo down by this creek out on the back of

the campus. And this is what I had no reason

to say. That's fear, I said. And if you can't

find me when you get here, they have buried my

body by that gazebo down by the creek. I got

all just inducted into the wildness of Pentecostalism because that

was kind of the thriving heartbeat of what was happening

at the time, right And then I got saved a

couple of months later, and God just radically transformed my

life through a bad circumstance. And ever since then, God

has been teaching me things. God has been showing me

things and those things that I once was absolutely sure

and dogmatic about. As I have read God's word and

God has showed me things, I have softened on some

things and become more steadfast on other things. But it's

not through the persuasive words of people or what some

cool guy on TBN says, or I found this guy

on the internet man, and oh he's got a million followers,

so everything he says must be true. It's come through

God's word, not somebody else telling me God's word, but

through me being in God's word and digging out those

principles that are life changing in an intimate time with God.

The academic side of discipleship come sitting in our home

by ourselves, when we turn the worship music off and

we just look in scripture, not to find a sermon

to preach or a lesson to teach. But we just

look in scripture to try to find God and his

will for my life. Mastering God's word increases our ability

to believe. It increases our ability to perform, It increases

our ability to love, It increases our ability of everything.

And this is the one thing that I think the

church does the poorest job off is self quiet time,

Bible study, pastor Clay, you can get ready. When we

talk about scripture, when we talk about the Bible, it's

not a tool to win an argument. It's a tool

to build a life. It is a tool to energize

our faith so that we can stand against every natural

system that says you're not gonna make it. You don't

have enough, you're not enough, you're not good enough, you're

not smart enough, you're never gonna be that. That system

on the inside of us, that faith that's built can

stand against those things. And they can say, you know what,

I know what they say about me, but they're not right.

I know what it looks like, but that's false. They

tell me I could never But I'm going to show

them because God says that I'm above and not beneath it.

I'm the head and not the tale. That greater is

he who is in me than he who is in

the world, That I'm more than a conqueror, that I

overcome by the word of the Lamb, by the blood

of the Lamb, and the word of my testimony, that

I am God's word. Because God's word framed my world,

and it's framing me. And everything it says I can

have and do. I can not because it says it,

but because I know it. And my faith has been

built on the knowledge that comes from God's word, and

my faith is the currency of the Kingdom. In Romans

chapter ten, verse nine, it says, if you confess with

your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart

that God has raised him from the dead, you will

be saved. For with the heart one believes into righteousness,

and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. That

from the very beginning, that we start our spiritual journey

with belief and action, belief and action, belief and action,

and the perfect marriage of belief in action. That's what

faith is. I wonder today, if you study your heart,

if you look deep on the inside, if you believe

you're in that place where it's a perfect marriage of

belief and action that when I look at the things

I'm struggling with, is that do I have that mixture

of belief and action? If I'm in a stressful time

in my marriage, am I getting God's word on marriage

and being the best husband or wife that I can

through my actions and the love that I display. If

I'm struggling parenting my child, have I found out what

God's word says about that parent child relationship? And am

I doing everything I can to be a good parent

or a good child Because faith moves us to action,

But it's God's word that dictates the action. That perfect

combination moves the world around you. In church, I want

the very best for you. I believe that this is

the greatest assembled group of people in the history of earth.

That's how good I think you guys are. But there's

more for you. There's more. There's peace, there's hope, there's power,

there's love, there's wisdom, there's kindness, there's joy unspeakable, and

it all starts in God's Word. If you're here today,

this is all just like, I don't even know what

you're talking about. Man, God's Word, that's just crazy. I'm

and read a book. Maybe you've never had an encounter

with Jesus, maybe you've never asked him to forgive you

of your sins and be the lord of your life.

But today you want to turn your entire life over

to him. Seeing God's word that I believe, every single

word of it is true. It says that he was

born to die for you, and two thousand years ago,

because of his love for you, he submitted himself to

be beaten beyond human recognition. They spit on him, and

they mocked him. As he carried the instrument of his

own death down those dusty streets of Jerusalem. With a

last bit of energy he had left, he climbed the

incline of this hill named Calvary. And it was there

that the Son of God laid himself down on a

cross and allowed those nails to be hammered through his

hands and his feet because of his love for you.

We don't deserve it, we can't understand it, but it's true.

And then all you have to do, all you have

to do for Him to save you from your sins

and set you on a path towards Heaven and not hell,

is to believe in your heart and confess with your mouth.

If you would, every ahead bowed and every eye closed

in the room today. If you're here today and you

want to ask Jesus to wash you and save you

from sin, change your eternal destination, set you towards Heaven today,

fast you and you want to ask Jesus to be

the lord of your life, just slip your hand up

and say that's me. Pastor pray for me. I want

to I want to give my life to Jesus today.

Just put your hand and put it right back down.

That's all we need. It's okay, we can wait. Hey man, everybody,

I open your eyes, look at me. Everybody here is

on their way to heaven, according to the show of

hands and says. Sometimes we get discouraged about things like that,

but I want to tell you, I'm I'm there's nothing

discouraged about everybody turning their life over to Jesus. What

that means is we're all family here together. So if

you will, let's stand together, let's worship as the band place.

Then we're gonna end with a time of prayer for

our teachers and staff and kids. Past Clay