Chasing the Change - Bro Caleb Roadcap 8-11-2024

Morning.

I'm very glad to have our pastor in his vendor,

that I, like everyone else, would prefer to hear our

pastor this morning. I'm say thinking when we got here

Wednesday night, looking forward to hearing the preach tonight.

Yeah.

Really, if you'll be turned into Luke chapter nineteen.

Everything for this opportunity and the confidence, our passion of

confidence of the Lord truly.

Is a good God. As you turn into lut chapter nineteen,

I would be looking at verses one through ten. Living here,

he says. Then Jesus entered and passed through Jericho, and

behold there was a man named Zacchis, which was of

the chief among the publicans, and he was rich, and

he sought to see Jesus who he was, and could

not for the press, because he was of little stature.

He was little of stature, and he ran before and

climbed up into a sycamore tree you to see him,

for he was to pass that way. And when Jesus

came to the place, he looked up and saw him

and said, unto him, Zacchius, make haste and come down,

for today I must abide at thy house. And he

made haste and came down and received him joyfully. And

when he saw it, they all murmured, saying that he

was gone to be with gone, to be a guest

with a man that is a sinner. And Zacchius stood

and said, unto the Lord, be old Lord, the half

of my goods I give to the poor, and I

have taken. If I've taken anything from any man by

false accusation, I restored to him fourfold. Jesus said to

him this day salvation has come to this house, for

as much as he also is the son of Abraham,

For the son of Man is come to seek and

to save that which was lost the stretcher hands. And

pray this morning, to be honest, the load of what

I have in my notes of the low that I

felt the Lord give me was already said Wednesday night,

and by our pastor and sister how and I honestly

I began to pray. Between then and this morning. I

was praying for maybe a change in something different, and

trying to because I'll be very honest, I felt with them.

The presence of the Lord was so strong Wednesday night,

and the drawing power and the president of the Lord

to change somebody's life, to pull somebody. It was so strong,

and I felt like Pastors, he already He's already said everything,

and the Lord was already here. So I'm praying and

as the church to pray that that atmosphere, an atmosphere

for change, would be present once again. As we preached

this morning on the chase of change. And there's two

points mentally that will go through and hit back and forth,

and one of it is chased by change and the

second one is chasing the change. And this story is

very familiar with many of us. The kids Sunday school

class just learned about it last Sunday. I believe. And

there's also some things that were in my heart that

Brother Samuel spoke last Sunday morning, I believe when he

was testifying and exhorting, And a lot of it goes

right along with this. But how many of us this

morning came looking for something from the Lord? We came

looking to hear from God, Brother Nathaniel taught this morning.

But how many of us also believe we know God

is here, But how many of us believe that God

came to do something for us? Not only did we

come looking for him to move, but he came looking

for us to be responsive, responsive to what He has

for us this morning. And this is account. Like I said,

we many of us have heard this story. If you've

been in church for any period of time, social if

we're raised in church, we've heard this story from a

young age. And it's still my understanding. This story is

only this account is only recorded in the Gospel of Luke,

And in verse two we are introduced to this this

main character of these scriptures right here, apart from Jesus,

zach k is he was a chief tax collector returns

to his occupation, and commoners say that his position was

very honorable, and it was very profitable, and it was

very desirous, at least from those from the Roman side

of the side of the situation. Here. The Romans were

known to put their taxes on the nations that were

under their control and under their rule in order to

finance their empire, in order to support their their living

and their way of life, and their military and those

sorts of things. And as we move on, we go

down to verse three and it says that Zacchius sought

to see Jesus who he was. And I begin to

think specifically why Zacchius was seeking out Jesus. I mean,

I know inderstand that Jesus was becoming popular. He was

becoming somebody that everyone was talking about. He was doing miracles,

he was doing mighty things. He was helping people, healing people,

raising people from that that many things. Certainly he was

being talked about. Certainly zak Kias had heard about it

from somewhere. But I began to wonder why, specifically that

he wanted to do who he was for himself, and

this word was mentioned. I saw it was already in

my notes. I wondered if perhaps he was out of misery,

because Zakis would have been, to my understand if I

understood correctly in my study, he would have been a Jew,

just like Matthew, who would have he betrayed his people

basically to do the work for the Romans, and so

many of them would have seen him as a trader

in a backstre and I'm sure that weighed on his

heart to some degree, and that he would have ultimately

been miserable. And I just I wondered if maybe that

was why. But then as I thought about the simulators

between zach Kis and Matthew also known as Levi, I

began to thank back. In Luke chapter five, fourteen verses prior,

it gives the account of Levi or Matthew, and it

says that he hosted a great feast in his house.

So there was many publicans, which were these people, and

many others that came and sat down with them. So

I began a kind of point. And I didn't read

this anywhere. I'm sure somebody else may have thought of

this before. But putting this together, I begin to wonder

Kazakis have been one of them that went, or could

I believe they'd more than likely had a mutual acquaintance.

That's very possible. Someone saw the change in Matthews. Someone

saw how he went from this luxurious lifestyle in the

eyes of the Romans and the eyes of the secular society.

But yet he gave it all because changed chased him down.

Change came to Matthew all of a sudden, he knocked

on his heart's door, and Matthew accepted the change. And

now here we are, fourteen verses later. I'm not entirely sure.

I didn't look into how much time they have passed,

and this time here we are, fourteen chapters later. I'm sorry,

And now somebody else. They're chasing change, and change is

chasing them. As we'll see here in a little bit.

Now we know that circumstances we're keeping zach his back.

It was keeping him from seeing Jesus. And so what

he had to do, as we read here, he was

of little stature. He couldn't see Jesus, he couldn't get

to Jesus. So what he had to do was move.

And I began to think in the physicals what so

many of us did. We got to a place where

things seemed to dry up, where we found ourselves, where

we were drawing up. We weren't getting exactly what we needed,

and we had to move. We're gonna make drastic measures

to get to a place where we had the opportunity

to see Jesus and to come into contact with Jesus.

And it's not just a physical movement of the location,

but believers in our hearts, and we have to change

ourselves spiritually, prepare ourselves spiritually. But God held Paris so

that we can get to that place, to where we

can see God and come in contact with God. As

we move on to verse four, it tells us of

the lance and the risk at which Zach was willing

to take. It says here that he ran, that he

climbed stressed because he wanted to see Jesus. He just

wanted to get a glimpse of this man, to potentially

see him do something, to hear him say something. He

just wanted to see Jesus. He realized his own inability.

That was something stresses. We can't do anything of our selves.

It was his own inability. But there was something he couldn't.

He could take action. We had to take action. And

there was a word several services ago that Burnham than

were using. It stood out to me it was mundane.

And he was talking about coming to the altar and

not being passionate in our prayer, you know at times,

and just having a mundane attitude towards maybe the ALTI

re towards service. That's not everyone, that's you know, but

at times, and we can find ourselves in that place.

But first fourth, the way it describes that his actions,

he was not passively pursuing. It wasn't just a mundane

trip to see Jesus. Maybe I'll see him, maybe I won't.

It says he ran, and then he climbed. He had

to exert some energy, to put in some effort. He

had to do a little something. I don't do it,

but I see a tax clicker as just sitting there.

But he had to put in a little bit more

than his daily routine required. He had to give more

and to get to Jesus. And it gets that place

where he could see Jesus. And I asked us, what

are we doing? What are we changing in our daily routine?

What are we changing in our weekly and monthly just

as we go about? What are we doing to step

it up a little bit to get to Cg's doing

what we have to do to get to Jesus and

to chase that change? And is it possible that sometimes

we need to change our methods when we find out

that they're not working. Oh, what we've been trying to do?

When we find out that we're too sure, We can't

through the crowd. Were trying to move over here, but

somebody else is in our way. It's not working for us.

We got to run somewhere else, get ahead of the

thing and climb up. We didn't get to a position

where we can see. To continue. On the verse six,

we see that Zach is obeyed Jesus told him what

to do. Then he obeyed. And that's very important because

so many times when we do come in contact with Jesus,

when we do come in contact with the change, what

we say that we won't. But then when something is

required of us, there's times where people are not fully obedient.

But it says that he obeyed, and he did it

willingly and joyfully. He didn't make excuses once the change

had presented itself. So many people they say that they're

chasing the change. They say that they want the change.

They may even do some great action of running ahead

and climbing up the tree, and they seem so much

that they want to see Jesus. They want to they

want to experience the change. But then when when they're

faced with that, what you need to do right? Yes,

in verse eight, the evidence of Zakia's change begins to show.

We see that he makes restitution and goes beyond. He

goes beyond that with the good works. We can't have

one or the other. It has to be both. We

can't just make restitution and then not continue on into

the good works. But we also cannot go into our

good works without making the restitution. We must have both.

And like Zaccheus, when the change took place, it was

so evident this man, who I'm sure was grit by greed,

which was fokem On said he was a very rich man.

He got his money sometimes so unlawfully, slightly by by tricks,

by lives and his greed, no doubt he But the

change where he gave it said he gave to the poor.

It doesn't. It doesn't say he repaid the poor. It's

that he gave back what he owed. But then he

gave above that, he gave more. And oh, what a

change that we see here. And as I was praying,

there was a phrase that came to mind, and it

was stuck in their ways. And then the words that

coincide with this is stagnant and unmoving, and they came

to mind. And you know, we cannot allow ourselves, we

cannot afford to allow ourselves to get stagnant or in

an unmoving state in our lives where again something is

required of us, but we're just still or possibly we've

been changed to a degree and we feel like we've arrived.

We cannot be staying. We cannot stay in the same place.

We have to continually seek Jesus. We have to because

in these scriptures, the followers of Jesus, they most of

them didn't just have an encounter and then just stay

where they were at a lot. There was those that

did and stay back and minister to their communities. But

there was a host of people that kept following Jesus.

And we are always we can't stay staying. We've got

to keep following Jesus. Going through the verses nine and ten,

the change chased down Zakis himself. We see here that

sorry backing up a little bit, The change chase down Zachis.

And in each service, every day, every year, during each outreach,

you know, God, Jesus himself is reaching out to change

lives and souls. He wants to make their change in

people's life. He's the only one who can make the

ultimate change, to change that sticks. He's the only one

who can. But people have to want help. People have

to want the help that Jesus can do. He is

the change. The change will chase you down, but he

will not force himself upon you. Opportunity will present itself.

Jesus will knock on your door, but he will not

beat your door down. He cannot. He will not force

himself in. You have to be willing to allow the

change and allow Jesus to come in. And truly I

thought I had this here. I guess I missed over it.

But Change chase them Zakis, and I fully believe it

says here Jesus called it by name. Jesus knew whom

he was coming to see. Jesus knew I hear his

passing that way. But I fully believe Change was chasing Zaki's.

Zach Has had to chase the change. And zach Is

wouldn't have been determined had him and been serious and

made his way and put in that effort and put

in that action and climbing up there. I don't I

don't know that Jesus would have parted the crowd and

pointed him out. I don't know that that would have happened.

And so many times, and I've been like this before

when I was younger, I waited for a preacher or

a pastor or somebody to point me out of the crowd,

to call me up for prayer, to call me up

to obey God. And ultimately, and there was times that

maybe that happened, But most of the time when that

happened was because I was unsure. It wasn't because I

was being disobedient. But besides the case, when when we

do it willingly and we come, then that's when God

meets with us. When God sees our action, that we

make ourselves at his bidding and what he called what

he as for us to do. And going on though

we talk about how the sinners need to be changed, Yes,

the backsids need to be changed. Yes, but we, as

black bought Christians, we continue to daily need a change.

As I said, those that were changed was a host

of them that kept following Jesus. And as a believer,

we must continue to grow in grace every day and

we must always ask God to change us. There's a

phrase from one of the Bible Callsures. They have this

song and there's this lyric that says, Lord, fix what

I see, but God, please fix me. So many times

it's so easy to set ourselves as maybe the standard,

and we say, well, I'm doing this and I'm doing that,

So fix them. Fa f situation, how I think it

should be fixed. Fix this person, change this person how

I think they should be fixed. But God, fix me,

fix what I say I'm praying for that person. I'm

praying for the situation. Fix what I see, but fix me,

fix my heart if I'm not seeing something clearly. I

began to think of Cornelius in the in the Book

of Acts. When he was a he was devout, he

was a gentile, a gentile Jewid. He converted to Judaism.

He served God with his whole heart. He loved the Lord,

he loved God. He was a good man. He had

been changed. But then when Peter presented himself presented him

with another change, Cornelius had to have an open heart.

And what happened in that account is those that were

there were filled with the Holy Ghost. And what a change.

At the beginning of this I had such a burden

for somebody that leaned up like Zacchius. Do more be

active when obi has presented, so bea or you know,

be obedient. But then, as I'm gonna think about us

as Christians, how we still there's so much growing to do.

And when we see for the Holy ghosts, we're chasing

the change. But he's also chasing us. He wants to

feel us. He's here with us, and oh, what a change.

The Holy Ghost is present in Romans, chapter eight and

verse number two. It says, for the law of the

Spirit of life in Christ, Jesus has made me free

from the law of sin and death. That sounds like

a change to me. The law of the Spirit, the

Holy Ghost, He's present every facet of the Christian experience.

He's there in salvation, he's there in sanctification. It's the

Holy Ghost, the Spirit of God that works in each

of these facets of the experience. And this verse is

following chapter seven, or is talking about the law of

sin and talking about being under the law of sin.

But for the law of the Spirit it made him free.

I'll stand, we say the other night, I'm glad that

I could say I'm one of them. And as we

were singing, I was humble at the part there, because

without him, without that change, without having a willing heart

to pursue the change, and without him pursuing me and

chasing me down, I could never say that I was

one of them. And I pray that the Lord would

just come out here this morning, and that there would

be an opportunity in an atmosphere that we would come

to the altar expecting the change. The word alter alt

r is the place where we pray Altar. I'm sorry,

and but what happens there alt are we are altered,

we are changed, And I just pray that somebody would

get that change here this morning, because truly it's chasing

you down. It's for months the Lord has been doing

It was so many and just to press the Lord

that we felt wednesday it was so strong, and the

burden that our pastor has every service, and the burden

of the evangels, and the burden of the other preachers.

I'm just another I'm just another voice. And I'm sure

maybe somebody else would have been more effective, But this morning,

I just want to remind somebody change is chasing you.

Like we said Wednesday night, it's not to embarrass you.

It's not up.

To cast you down. It's got a blog and it's

have a mercy that change has been chasing you. It's

not just our pastor feels like this is how you.

He would be happier if you did this, he would

be It would please him because you're pleasing the Lord.

If we can all just find a place to pray,

I pray that we don't have that mundane attitude, but

that we we come and are active, not passive, but

passion here this morning.

They go.

Listen to me, you pray.

It's so easy, said, change me at all to be.

Just like.

Movie my African, Change me, he comes off, Jane, change.

Me, change me, go le me stay the same for.

Want to be more like.

Take my life, make my life.

That you wanted to be. Please change me.

Change me, Lord, change me, Lord, change me.

Lord, don't lady, stay the same, for I want to

be more. Take eat my load, made my life, oh

that you.

Wanted to be? Please change me.

Change the Lord.

To say, and I'm not satisfied to take.

Lord.

I want to be closer.

So it's somehow you see there's a change that I need.

The Lord changed me to be more?

Change me, Lord, change me, Lord, go lead me stay

the same for.

I want to be.

Wing Please take my life.

Would you make my life all.

That you wanted to be? Please change me, change me? Lord.

Wo we I knew to pay. It's so easy to say,

change me, Lord to be.

King. Oh queen you be to making.

More of my life again to say change me, you

go hard? Or change me lord, change me, Lord, go

lord me stay the same, for I want.

To be for life.

Take my life, taking my life, Oh that you wanted

to be Lord. Please change me, change mer