Guest Minister - Brian Salley

Thanks for checking out the Anchor Faith Message podcast

from St. Augustine, FL.

Now enjoy this message. Oh man, settle down.

I hadn't even said anything yet. Right?

Happy to be here. You guys know I'm not from

Florida because I obey the speed limit, but anyway, I've still

got here on time. I think that speed limit is more

of a suggestion for y'all. But anyway, glad to be here.

What a privilege it is to be here, man.

You guys have church on Wednesday night and y'all don't

just come together for something little, man.

You guys have full blown church, you know?

And you guys have. I mean that's normal to y'all,

but that's not normal. We travel a lot.

We go to different churches all the time.

And man, that's awesome. Just to be able to come

somewhere like this. I mean that's you guys are

blessed, you know we've known your pastors.

Yeah, give something to have. Hallelujah.

You guys are blessed. I've known your pastors for

years and man, they're awesome people.

Just what a wonderful place to be able to come here.

But you know, as Kara said, we're going to, we're going to

get into some of this tonight. Go to Matthew Chapter 9.

Matthew 9 · chapter mention

That's we're turning there. I'll share a couple of things

with you. The book, Simplify soul winning.

You hear that You know you know, maybe a little confusing.

What that is, is just a real simple book with simple

principles that will help you share your faith with someone

else in your life. Right.

This is not. We have a mutual friend, Roddy

Schaefer. You got he's probably ministered

here before. You know he's a crusade

evangelist man. I try to do a crusade one time

and failed miserably. So I'm not a crusade evangelist.

This. This book is not about that.

But this book will help you to share your faith.

Sure. Jesus, with those in your life,

those that you have contact with.

And so I encourage you to get a copy of that.

Again, I apologize we missed our shipment by an hour and a half.

Spent two hours on the phone with UPS trying to get him to

let me come pick it up and they wouldn't.

So anyway. But you know, we can get the.

Books shipped to you. But if you'd like an E copy of

the book, if you'll give us your your e-mail address, I'll send

you a free E copy of it or be on PDF and you can read it on your

phone or your tablet or computer or anything.

But our goal is just to get the word out there.

Amen. Just to get the word in there.

As as we shared earlier, you know, our mission that God kind

of gave us several years ago was to harvest harvesters.

And that's what we want to do. Amen is harvest is plentiful

here in Saint Augustine. Guess what?

I'll only be here for a couple days.

So it doesn't really help St. Augustine for me to know how to

win souls, right? But he's got a whole bunch of

people that are crazy enough about Jesus to come out to

church on a Wednesday night. Hallelujah.

Hey man. But so grab you a grab you a

copy of that book. As Kara said, we're looking to

double our partnership. And So what that means is we

need to raise an additional $100,000 per year in support and

an additional 100 partners per month.

So if one person wants to write a check for 100,000, make my job

much easier. But if you can't do that, we say

for as little as $10 a month you can help feed hungry children in

France. Mine, I have three boys and they

eat all the time and they keep growing.

I got to buy them clothes. So if y'all wouldn't eat so much

and grow so much, I wanted to raise so much money.

And Europe is expensive. That's the other thing.

I talked to other missionaries and they tell me their budget

was like, you couldn't rent a car over there for that much.

And But anyway, God, I said this Sunday morning, I said, you

know, in the Old Testament, one time the Lord said, is my arm

too short? I mean, you know what I'm

saying? His arm will reach all the way

over there to France. His arm will reach wherever

you're at in Saint Augustine. Amen.

Hallelujah. God is good.

Amen. So let's see.

Yeah, we got that. All right.

So sign up to partner, sign up to get our newsletter and find

out what's going on with us. You know, as European

missionaries, a lot of times what our job when we're here in

the States is to kind of educate people as people say, Europe,

you're you're a missionary to Europe.

That's kind of weird because I thought that's where the gospel

came to America. It was.

But if you've ever heard the phrase, America is only one

generation away from being a godless society.

You can get on a plane and go with me to Europe and I'll show

you first hand. Amen.

It really is. Europe as a whole is about 3%

born again. France one of the less that the

least at 1%, less than 1% born again.

And really, as we began to step into France, you know, our heart

began to, as we began to pray and we began to research and

take steps and go in and administer and pray and kind of

spy it out, our hearts went to the towns and villages because

we found out that's where nobody wanted to go, that's where none

of the ministers wanted to go is and where none of the

missionaries wanted to go. And we said let's go.

And so, you know, we went. God led us and helped us to, you

know, at by, at Rama. They told us if you're going to

do something you've never done before, go find somebody else

that's doing it and work with them.

It's great. There's nobody doing that in

France. So we said, Lord, what are we

supposed to do? We said, well, let's go to

language school. And the Lord said no.

And I said, Lord, this is not a good idea.

We'll do it. If I don't know how hard it was

going to be, I probably would have said no.

We're asked for another a transfer.

But praise God, we got there. We learned a lot the last six

years. And, you know, but we couldn't

have done it without partner churches like you guys.

I mean, just seriously, there's there's no other way.

You know, as missionaries there were totally dependent upon

support and so we can't, you know, can't work over there.

I don't have any skills anyway, other than looking good and

preaching and those don't pay a lot in France.

So anyway, let's go to Matthew, Chapter 9, as I already told

Matthew 9 · chapter mention

you, and we'll get into the word here tonight.

You got something? I'm only here with you for a few

moments, but I've got something that these things that I'm going

to share with you tonight. I didn't read them on in a book.

I didn't find them on somebody's blog or find a video on YouTube.

This is stuff I walked out myself and it'll help you.

Amen. I believe some of the things

that I faced and overcome the last three or four years, that

I'm not the only one in the body of Christ that are dealing with

some of these things. Amen.

And so I trust some of these things will be a blessing to you

tonight. But let's pray, Father, we just

thank you so much for the privilege of being here tonight.

Father was such precious and wonderful people.

Father, what a privilege it is to be here in St.

Augustine with Pastor Earl and Marcy and their wonderful,

wonderful congregation. We thank you tonight, Father,

for the Holy Spirit. We think that he's giving

revelation to each and everyone that's here or watching online,

or we're listening later on. Father, We thank you, Lord, that

you're opening our eyes. It would see wondrous things

from your law opening our ears to hear what your word would

saying to us, giving us wisdom, understanding and revelation of

your word. Father.

Helping us, Lord God, to have peace and freedom in our lives

so that we can get our eyes off of ourselves and look to the

harvest that's plentiful all around us.

Father. You've given us a mission,

Father, But it's. Hard to do that mission when

we're dealing with so much junk ourselves.

And so, Father, I thank you, Lord God, that you've given us

the tools. And I thank you, Lord, that

you're showing us how to use those tools, Father,

effectively, efficiently, so we can.

Run our race. So that we can reach the law.

So we can bring in the harvest and see Jesus come back and take

away a glorious church and be get to be a part of it.

What a privilege, Lord God to Live Today.

And so, Father, we thank you for that.

Tonight we thank you for your word.

We place a demand upon the anointing and just draw out of

that exactly what you have for us to receive tonight.

In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

We'll talk to you tonight. Tonight about 3 words talked

about mission, position and condition.

All right. So the first thing we're going

to see here, well, the first thing I'm just going to kind of

introduce and I thought out there, we're not going to spend

much time on it because I know that y'all got a special treat

for y'all. It's right outside.

But anyway, the first thing we're talking about is our

position when we receive Christ, When we come into the Kingdom of

God, we all have the same position that make sense.

So when we're in Christed as the way Mark Hankin said, I love

that phrase in Christed. When we get in Christed or Born

again, we are right with the Father.

Same position as Jesus. I can't improve that position.

I can't, you know, work extra or earn extra.

Do anything else to change that position.

That position is fixed. I'm born again.

I'm righteous once I get filled with the Spirit of God.

I've got you've got the same spirit if you've been filled

with the Holy Spirit that the pastor.

Earl and I get with the same one, you know, we don't have a

different spirit because we got to sit under Brother Hagan, You

know what I'm saying? It's not like the Lord said,

hey, you got to sit under Brother Hagan.

So here's a little difference. No, it's the same Holy Ghost.

Same position, all right. You and I've.

Got the same promises for us. In the word of God, there's not

a separate book. For for ministers, there's not a

separate book. You know, for one.

We've all got the same promises. Amen.

Now we've got different assignments.

And we may have specifically different missions in our lives.

You may not be called to go to France.

I'm not called the pastor here in St.

Augustine or go all the places that your pastor goes.

But so we may have different assignments, But the basic

mission, which is the second thing we're gonna spend a little

time talking about, we all have the same thing.

And that's. Harvest What do mean we?

Sharing the love of God with those around us.

They meant harvest. So let's look my lovely wife

already talked about John 435 and I love when she when she

shares that, you know you got to get your eyes off of yourself.

We were teaching one time in England when we first got in

there on on harvest and the Lord said the 1st wall we have to

overcome to share the gospel with someone is the wall we've

built around ourselves. So again, we got to get our eyes

off of ourself. Right, so Matthew Chapter 9.

Matthew 9 · chapter mention

Let's look here real quickly. Matthew Chapter 9, verse 35 says

Matthew 9:35

Jesus went about all the cities and villages teaching in their

synagogues and preaching the gospel of the Kingdom and

healing every sickness and every disease among the people.

But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on

them. Because they were, they fainted

and were scattered abroad, a sheep having no shepherd that

says he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous, but

the laborers are few. Now, three times Jesus uses this

phrase. The first one is in John 435,

the second one here is Matthew here in Matthew Chapter 9, verse

Matthew 9:37

37. And the third one is over in

Luke chapter 10, verse two. Same thing, he says.

Luke 10 · chapter mention

Anybody y'all ever told your kids something?

Three times? Everybody kids, me.

Are you growing up and your parents ever told you something?

Three times where I grew up in Louisiana.

But the third time, if I've not done what I've been asked to do,

there's usually a whooping that went along with it.

So I don't know if y'all can do that in St.

Augustine or not anymore, but. They could in Louisiana in the

80s, I'll tell you that. And so three times, Jesus makes

the same statement. Now he's using an agricultural,

a growing, a garden. You know, an agricultural

analogy here, but we know, you know, I farmed.

I grew. Up way out in the country,

Louisiana. And I farmed just enough as a

kid to know I didn't want to farm, didn't like it.

Didn't have fun. During COVID, you know, we were

locked down there in France and we had a lot of time on our

hands. And so I said, you know what,

I'm going to grow a garden. And so I went and bought some

seeds and I killed some lettuce. I killed some, I think radishes

and cucumbers. Brian's not a farmer.

Brian doesn't grow a garden. Brian will eat the vegetables,

but Brian doesn't grow. But even from my limited

agricultural experience, I know enough to know that it's not

just harvest, that there's other steps.

Right, but that's not what Jesus said was plentiful.

He said harvest is plentiful. What does that mean?

That means when we're out there, our mission is harvest to bring

him in. You know, when I was talking to

Karen and I looked out there and I saw Isaac, I'd already talked

to Isaac a couple times, tried to bring him in.

It was it quite right yet? And the Kara said that's a

divine appointment. She said go out there.

So I was able to go out there and bring him in next time I saw

him, was able to get him filled with the Holy Ghost.

Right? What am I saying?

We're out there to harvest. That's the mission, all right.

But but look here, Let's look the first thing Jesus said to

do. So this is.

All of our mission, mine, yours, pastorals, Pastor Marcy's cares.

Anybody that's a Christian God wants to use them to reach

theirs, those that are in their neighborhood, those that are in

around them. Amen.

For some of you, it may be going to a neighbor.

For others it may be just God. Just just learning how to hear

the spirit of God when God says go talk to that person.

Remember with Phillip, Phillip over there, the book of Acts.

We don't have time to look there this evening.

But you know, I loved because Phillip goes and he preaches to

them. You know, I'm saying he goes and

he gets a whole city born again, I mean, and then and then they

send Peter and John down there and all the stuff, this cool

stuff happens. So he goes to them.

But then the spirit of God says go to him, sends him to one guy.

He says go join yourself to that chair.

Not just any chariot, he's not just up there knocking on

chariot doors. Hey you, anybody ready to get

born if you say go to that chariot?

I said divine appointment. He goes to that chariot, and the

guy in that chariot was reading from Isaiah.

See, this guy's ready. If you read over there in John

Ford, Jesus actually says heart. He He says lift up your eyes and

sees harvest is plentiful. I've sent you to reap that for

which you've not even labored. But in order to reap that for

which we've not even labored, we're going to have to First off

realize harvest is plentiful. Secondly, we're going to have to

begin to pray. That's the the very next thing

Jesus says here in verse 38. Pray ye therefore the Lord of

the harvest that he would send forth laborers into his harvest.

Now we're going to keep reading here.

Matthew chapter 10, Matthew chapter 10 and many translations

Matthew 10 · chapter mention Matthew 10 · chapter mention

starts with an and and joins 2 things together.

So this is the continuation here, but I'm going to read it

from the message. The message.

Version here if I can find it. Yeah, Matthew 10 verse one.

It says the prayer was no sooner prayed than it was answered.

Jesus tells him to pray and then it says he answers the prayer

how he called. Twelve of his followers and sent

them into the right fields. He gave them power to kick out

evil spirits and to tenderly care for the bruised and hurt.

So we're talking about mission. Mission.

We've all got the same mission, all right.

We've all got the same position. We come into Christ.

Same position. Now, me walking in the mission

does not improve my condition. My positions.

That makes sense because, all right, here, here, Brown,

there's an extra little Gold Star for you there, you know?

No, it does. We're still, we've got the same

position. All right.

OK. Submission.

All right. Skip down to verse five.

It says Jesus gives some further instructions.

He says Jesus sent his 12 harvest hands out with this

charge. Don't begin by traveling to some

far off place to convert unbelievers.

Don't try to be dramatic by tackling some Public Enemy.

Go to the lost, confused people right here in the neighborhood.

Tell them that the Kingdom is here.

Bring health to the sick. Raise the dead.

Touch the untouchables. Kick out the demons.

You've been treated generously, so live generously.

Don't think you have to put on a fundraising campaign before you

start. You don't need a lot of

equipment. You are the equipment.

He says and all you need to keep going is 3 meals a day travel

light right? So here we go.

Jesus says harvest is plentiful. He says pray and then he says go

to to put that in the redneck version he would say, Jesus

said. Y'all pray and then y'all go

Amen. Kind of reminds me of a boss I

had in Texas when I first started working for this guy.

He would say, Brian, do you want to go clean the stockroom?

And I would say Nope. Little bit later he'd say, Brian

go clean the stockroom, so. Finally I learned.

That when he said we or he said do you want to?

That meant yes, I did want to. It's kind of like a woman and my

wife says, do you want to do this?

Well, I didn't want to stop for coffee, but I will now.

Evidently I just had that desire.

I'm going to stop and get a cup of coffee for you.

I drank my own coffee. I don't like to pay for coffee.

So Jesus said, y'all pray and then y'all go all right.

That's the mission. See, the assignment may be

different. Whether you call the pastor,

whether you're called to be a missionary, whether you're

called to be an auto mechanic or a bus driver, whatever we're

called to do, we've got the same mission.

Okay. But here's the problem that I

ran into. Maybe you don't have this

problem, but I ran into this problem that my condition was

messed up. Said Lord gave me this example.

Say you're not like to run and so, but imagine that I wake up

tomorrow and I haven't run, you know, for 30 years and I just

wake up one morning and say as a 48 year old man, I'm going to go

out and run a marathon. Well, if you've got any sense,

the first thing you see that's a mission.

You got a mission, You want to run a marathon, that's 26.2

miles for those of y'all that don't know.

So you say I want to run a marathon.

If you got any sense, the first thing you do is you go to the.

Doctor to find out if you're. Have the right position, OK.

Go, the doctor said. Hey, I want to make sure my

heart's not going to explode at mile three or four or five or 10

or 19 or 20 or 21 or 22 or 20. It's 26 point.

That's a lot of miles. Y'all the longest I've run is 14

miles and I only did that because I did my route wrong.

And when I got to 12, which was supposed to been a 12 mile run,

I still had two miles to go to the motorcycle.

So when nobody coming to pick me up, there's no Ubers in the

middle of nowhere in France, so. So anyway, so you know, you go

to the doctor and the doctor checks you out and says all

right, you got the you've got the seal of approval, you can go

and do it. So you've got a mission now

you've got a position you can do it. #3 though what we got to

work on is the condition I. Could run 10 miles tonight.

I can run the first three in my cowboy boots.

I couldn't run 26.2 tonight. Why?

Because I'm not in the right condition.

All right. So this is what we're going to

talk about here, all right? We're going to fly.

By Luke Chapter 10. Just so I can just so we can

Luke 10 · chapter mention

show it to you. Luke chapter 10 verse one.

Luke 10 · chapter mention

So we got Jesus and John 435 says harvest is plentiful over

here. Luke, Matthew 9.

He says he says the same thing to the 12 sends them out.

Now here again he's going to say the same thing.

And Luke chapter 10 verse one. After these things the Lord

Luke 10 · chapter mention

appointed 70 others also and sent them two by two before his

face into every city and place whether he himself would come.

Therefore he said to them, harvest truly is great.

Third time, third time. The head of the church has made

this statement. Harvest truly is plentiful.

And the reason I've been labored this point is a lot of times we

take a scripture and we kind of misquote it and we say, well,

you know, I just like to plant seeds and somebody else waters.

That's not the context of that scripture.

That scripture is Paul talking to the church in Corinth.

And what that's saying is, hey, as a pastor, Paul laid a

foundation and he said Apollos came in and watered it or built

on it. He said he's planted seeds.

So your pastors have planted seeds that I as a traveling

minister and watering, that's the context of that.

Why do I say that? Because when we're out there,

we're there to harvest. Why?

Because somebody's killed going to hell.

Until they receive Jesus, until they've been harvested, until

they've been brought in, they're still going to hell.

That's why I spend a little bit of time belaboring that point.

But let's get to Romans chapter 12, Romans chapter 12.

Romans 12 · chapter mention Romans 12 · chapter mention

As we're getting here, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm, I'm I'm a

little vulnerable when I preach and I'll talk about other

people, I'll talk about myself. Aren't you glad I don't talk

about you looking up your Facebook and stalking you?

And hey, did you know that Bill's been over?

I'm just kidding, all right? So here we are three years ago.

We come up to, you know, with Covet Hit and man just, I mean,

I remember calling Tad Greg Rich and I was like, if y'all said

what to do, that's the Dean of Raymond there in the States.

I said if Y'all said what to do if the whole world loses its

ever loving mind. I was absent that day because I

don't know, you know, so Covet hit and it was just crazy.

And that when we began to see it as missionaries, you know, we

began to see missionaries all over the world were recalled

from the field. The whole organizations were

pulling their people off the field.

And so we said, Lord. What do we do?

And he said, stay. And again I said, Lord, I don't

think this is a good idea, but I'll do it.

So. So we stayed.

But during this time, our first lockdown, we could only go 1

kilometer outside of our home. All right.

For those of y'all that don't speak kilometers, that's eight

tenths of a mile We could go outside of our home Now.

Thank God we lived in the country 8 tenths of a mile from

my house. I can be in the woods.

Because if I'd had to do lockdown like that in Paris, I'd

have killed somebody. So I'd have been starting a

prison ministry in France. Jesus, so we're there.

We got a lot of time on our hands already told you I tried

to grow a garden and realized you know, I can't garden either.

And so, but during this time now prior to this.

I. Had been dealing with stuff in

in my heart, in my, in my soul, in my mind.

One of them was anxiety. When we stepped out to be

missionaries, man, anxiety, like a person, just was constant with

me. Every time we'd have to go do

something with the government or apply for something.

I mean, I was a nervous wreck. And the problem with that is not

only how it affected me, but how it affected my family and those

around me. Anxiety was one, depression was

another one. I mean, just going through bouts

of depression because, you know, we'd go in and we'd come in with

a great vision. We're coming.

We're going to change France and we get there and see how hard it

is and see betrayals and see false brethren.

The longer my missionary, the more I understand the Apostle

Paul when he writes stuff. For instance, you ever read over

there where he said we've we've been in fastings often.

That don't mean he's spiritual. That means the money ran out and

they didn't have an ATM card. There was no Venmo or PayPal or

any of this stuff like that. They just said, what are we

eating tonight boys? Nothing we're going to.

Fast tonight, all right. I understand a lot of these

things, so we deal with all the stuff in it and I would just get

depressed. And again, how it affects me is

one thing, but how it affects my family, those around me is

another thing. Here's the other thing too.

All of this that I'm dealing with looking down at myself as

affecting my mission. See, my assignment is called to

go to France, to harvest harvesters, to win souls, to

bring people into the Kingdom. But I'm not doing a very good

job. Now assignment wise, I'm I'm

living the dream I've I've lived you know in two different

countries. I'm traveling I'm, I'm you know

I'm pastoring at the time getting to preach in French only

because I had to because our translators quit.

Did it again. I said Lord this is not a good

idea but I'll go do it. So so I'm dealing with all of

this stuff and now over the years guys I tried everything

that every, every preacher I've ever heard talk about you know

try to get rid of this stuff. I had tried all kind of things

and and it didn't work to the point that I just got to the

place where I said, I guess this is the way it'll always be.

Just kind of resigned myself to this.

And during COVID, you know, I mean, like I said, it was just a

crazy time. We had so much time on our

hands. And I just said, Lord, I just

want some more of you during this time.

But during this time I was already reading my Bible, you

know, and doing it devotional every day.

And you know, I was getting things from God and I was

preaching, you know, and and doing things.

But I just said I want some more of you now as a missionary

living overseas. I fast tacos.

Every day of my life. So fasting food, not really that

big a deal for me, you know what I'm saying?

And I fast Culvers. Anybody discovered Culvers and

custard? Oh, Jesus, there's going to be

custard in heaven, I can tell you that.

But anyway, we don't have that stuff in France, so fasting food

was not it. But I said, Lord, what I'm going

to do during this time is I like to read fiction books.

And I said what I'm going to do is I'm just go fast fiction

during this time. I said instead of reading the,

you know, instead of reading a book, I'm just gonna read the

Bible. I'm just gonna start, you know,

I just started over there. I love to read about David and

the old, you know, on the the stories of the Kings and all

those. I just started reading over

there. Now again, I've already told you

I'm a runner. I like to run.

So for years as a runner when I would be out and when I run, I

don't want to be around anybody. I don't want to run with

anybody. I want to.

The only man made thing I want to hear is my footsteps.

You know, I'm saying I like to run in the woods, I like to run

by the river. And so when I would be out

running though the whole time I'm running, I'm fighting

thoughts, I've got stuff coming in where there's anxiety, where

there's depression, whether it's this out or the other.

And the whole time I'd be running, I'd be praying in

tongues and be bind and loosened trying to do all this stuff,

putting on worship music. And again, nothing worked.

So here we are about three years ago during COVID and I said I'm

a fast fiction, so I started reading maybe six or seven

chapters from the Old Testament. Just I wasn't studying it in

depth. I wasn't looking up the Hebrew,

you know what I mean? Just reading it.

And after about 3 weeks go by and I was out on the run.

Never forget it. I was out running through a

vineyard. There's vineyards everywhere in

France. I was running through a vineyard

about by our by our town and I was running along.

I've been running for 45 minutes.

I will send it down to me. I've not had one single anxious

thought. For 45 minutes, I've not had one

single. I've not had to buy anything or

loose anything or do anything else.

And I'm like, what? What's going on?

I've described it like this. Imagine you had a jackhammer

operating outside your bedroom window or your office window for

40 years. Some of this stuff I've been

dealing with for 40 years. And all of a sudden, one day it

stopped it taking a while to figure out what's going on.

You know, I'm saying it just what's different?

What's changed? And I said, what has changed?

I began to have a piece of the freedom that I'd only had in

small moments. Of my life.

Never been able to reproduce it. Never been able to find out how

I got there. Does it make sense?

Like little glimpses of it. And I began to have a peace and

a freedom. I went and I went.

Lord, the only thing I've changed.

I'm still praying in tongues. I'm still living over here

fasting tacos and fasting custard.

You know I mean, nothing else has changed.

The only thing that's changed is I I'm reading more the word.

Just reading more the word. Almost Chapter 12, verse one,

since I beseech you there for brethren, by the mercies of God,

that you present your bodies and living sacrifice, holding

acceptable and unto God, which is your reasonable service.

We see something here. Just with a few moments we've

got left. We see the Apostle Paul telling

us we're going to have to do something with our bodies, with

ourself. We're going to have to lay aside

the negative. So that makes sense.

We're going to leave the negative on this side of the

pulpit. OK, but how?

How? How do we, chapter 2 or verse 2,

be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the

renewing of your mind that you may prove?

What is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God?

All right, let's flip over to Ephesians chapter 4.

Ephesians 4 · chapter mention

We can go to four places real fast.

You know, there's two different types of people from the South.

There's ones that talk real slow and there's me, I'm the fast

talking one. So like Mark Hankin says, if you

can listen fast, I can talk fast and we can get the rest of this

out. Ephesians Chapter 4, verse 21.

Ephesians 4:21

If so be that you have heard him and been taught by him, as the

truth is in Jesus that you put off concerning the former

conversation. The old man, which is corrupt,

anxiety, depression. That's part of the old man.

That's not part of the new package.

I'm just going to tell you like that if we come into Christ and

we're dealing with some of this junk or other junk like that,

that's not part of the new package, we're supposed to lay

that aside. And I tried for years some stuff

for decades. Couldn't do it.

Couldn't do it. All right, let's see here it

says verse 22 that. You put off concerning the

former conversation, the old man which is corrupt according to

the deceitful lust, and be renewed in the spirit of your

mind. And then here's the new man.

Then we put on the new man, which after God has created in

righteousness and true holiness. So I began to read 678 chapters

extra in the Word, and I said, Lord, I had tears in my eyes.

I want to look God, I said. Lord, I've tried for years.

To get this level of peace and freedom that I'm walking in

these last few weeks, the only thing I've changed is I've read

more the word. Are you telling me it was that

simple all along? And he said yes.

And I said, Lord, I've fasted, I've prayed in tongues, I've

listened to preaching, I've worshiped, I've had hands laid

on me. You can tell I've had a lot of

hands laid on my head. But none of that.

Worked with this as far as this goes these problems.

Are you telling me all I had to do was read more of the words?

And he said yes. And I said, why?

Why didn't all the other things that I did fix that?

Why didn't anything else change my condition?

And he said you were trying to do with other good spiritual

things would only mind renewal will do.

And he, he gave me this example. I like to watch those survival

shows, you know, on TV where they drop somebody off and they

got to go. So I don't like the ones where

they're naked, but the ones where their clothes are normal.

You know what I'm saying? You got to clarify that, so.

But you when you watch these shows, there's four different

needs. Really.

Five there. Four or five different needs

that every human being, no matter who we voted for in the

election, no matter who we root for on Saturday at the the

football game, nothing, no matter our color or race or

creed, we all as human beings have to have four basic needs

met or we die as human. That's a pretty big problem.

Dying's a pretty big problem as a human being.

So the first one is oxygen. Got to have oxygen?

Take the oxygen away. We're dead moments.

The 2nd is water. Depending on conditions we can

make it days or maybe a week or two with no water.

The third though is lack of food.

We take the food away. Again, depending on the

condition, I've got a little bit of extra, you know, margin here

and some of you people might, some might be able to last a

little bit longer, but still, you know, weeks, no food, we're

dead. But the 4th would be protection

from the elements. You know, again, if I wear this

light shirt and just these cowboy boots and I go up on Mont

Blanc, the highest point in Europe in a snowstorm, I'm dead

in hours saying then the fifth one would be rest.

And the Lord said, you can't substitute one for the other.

That's what I've done for years is I just tried to worship and I

tried to pray and I tried to fast and I tried to do all of

these other things that are good things, that are necessary

things, but they don't renew my mind.

They don't enact or enable transformational power in my

life that I desperately needed. I was ready to quit, was living

the. I had the dream of the

assignment that I wanted and and and wanted for years, but I

disdained it because of my condition.

Didn't want to do it anymore. So, Lord, I can't do this.

I can't do it. I can't do it.

And again using this, you know that using analogy, there's

oxygen in this water. But if there's no oxygen in this

room, we're dead because we can't get it out of there.

So it makes sense. You can't substitute one for the

other. Let me show you two more

scriptures. So as I began to do this, as I

saw that as I increased, just taken in the word, just reading

the Bible. Continue to do the other things

but could but increasing my word intake, I began to walk in a

level of peace and freedom. It began to increase.

Not only that, the negative was gone.

Does that make sense? I found that if I read 8

chapters a day, at least minimum, the negative was was

they had no power and that's great.

But the greatest thing, gosh, was the revelation that began to

flow. The understanding, the things

that God began to illuminate to me, to get things that God began

to speak to me. Other things that he began to be

able to do in my life because I was renewing my mind, Because I

was. See, here's the thing the Lord

said. We've been caught up fighting

unnecessary battles and carrying unnecessary burdens, and the

devil keeps us distracted fighting with all of this junk

and doing all these other things that that don't work.

All right, so I've just got a couple minutes left.

Let's let's look real quickly over here to to James, Chapter

one. Same thing.

We're going to see this. We see this over and over and

over again. This affects my condition, not

my position. Makes sense.

My my position doesn't change. God doesn't love me more now

that I've walked in without of walked in victory over this

stuff than he did before. Yeah, you understand.

It's not. It's not that it's now.

I've affected my condition, and I am the only person on the

planet or in the universe that can affect my condition.

Jesus can't do it for me, man. I wish it.

I wish we could do this by laying on hands.

Man, I sure do, but it doesn't happen that way.

But it's simple. Not easy, but it's simple.

So James chapter one, verse 21 says we're for lay apart all

filthiness and superfluidive naughtiness.

We got that on this on over here.

Then he says, receive with meekness the engrafted word

which is able to save your souls.

The word save is not talking about our eternal preservation,

but it's talking about like like we would restore an old car or

an old house or something, an old piece of furniture.

That's that's that type of restored restoration.

So it restores my soul, my mind, my will and my emotions.

See, those problems I was facing was in my flesh and in my soul.

Not in my spirit, but in my flesh and in my soul.

And as I began to renew my mind and keep it renewed, keep it

renewed, then transformation began to happen and it began to

affect those around me and it began to affect my mission.

Amen. Last one.

First Peter, First Peter, Chapter 2.

1 Peter 2 · chapter mention

And just just to kind of give you a tool here that we've got

available for you for free on our book table back there.

I just did a little research and I found this very simple Bible

reading system where you read from 10 different places in the

Bible, 10 different lists. It's not a plan where it's not

based on date or anything like that.

You know, I'm saying you just, you read one that you can see my

ribbons there. That my ribbons that's from my

different places that I read. You finish one list and you just

start over and you so every day I'm reading 10 different places.

When I began to do this again, the negative continued to fall

away. And the positive I began to grow

in ways that I had tried for years and years and years and

years. So we've got this available for

you if you want to pick up one of those in our table or if you

want to look it up. It's called the Professor Grant

Horner Bible Reading System. There's nothing magical about

it, but man, it's a great tool. When I began to do this, the

coolest thing about this is what me.

There's there's tons of cool things, but what's so awesome is

see the Holy Ghost. So show me something here in the

first list and then I'll show it to me in the second list and the

third list. And by the time I'm done, he'll

have showed me the same thing 10 times.

I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed, but if you show me

something 10 times, I'll eventually get it.

Does that? Does that make sense?

So man, I can't tell you enough about this.

I highly, highly, highly encourage you to do this, but

let's let's look at the first Peter chapter 2 verse one.

1 Peter 2 · chapter mention

Therefore, laying aside all malice, guile hypocrisies,

envies, and evil speakings, as newborn babes, desire the

sincere milk of Pret, and tox desire the sincere milk of

worship. Desire, the sincere milk of the

word. I had three babies and I watched

him. And, man, when it was time to

eat, it was not like a casual thing, you know, The baby was

not like, well, mom, I don't know what you've got prepared

tonight. You know, it's well, I could

eat. No, it was like, get out of the

way. I mean, you know, I'm saying.

And it wasn't like, just well today.

I'm not very hungry. No, it was Hey, I two hours ago.

And guess what? I'm gonna eat again in two

hours. So what I'll do with the word is

I'll take some in in the morning and I'll take some more and

maybe in the middle of the day, and I take some more at night

before I go to bed. Amen.

That. So as newborn babes desire the

sincere milk of the word that you may what grow thereby

because there's things that we need to grow ourselves out of

that we never will if we don't do this again. 26 years of

ministry at the time when I when I stumbled into these things. 23

years of ministry. Been a missionary for seven

years at the time, been to Bible school, done all of these

things, but I was struggling with stuff that I didn't have to

struggle with. Hey man, I just had to make some

changes in my own life. Let me just put let me just

throw this out here. I'm going to, I'm going to turn

it over to Pastor Earl here in just a second.

It takes an average of 4 minutes to read most Bible chapters.

So if I read 10 chapters, that takes 40 minutes.

That's one episode of Swamp People.

I mean, I can give up in it, but I like swamp people.

Chew them. You know, I like Swamp People,

but I've never watched an episode of Swamp People that

changed my life. I mean, you understand what I'm

saying? It's worth giving some of these

things. It's worth doing whatever we've

got to do. And here's something.

Here's something the Holy Ghost told me as I stumbled into these

things. I mean, I literally did.

I stumbled into him. And as I begin to enact a man,

I've seen transformation in my life.

I've seen man. I've got renewed mission.

I've got renewed vision. I don't want to quit the

ministry anymore. I don't want to quit being a

missionary anymore. I want to go back and win more

souls for Christ. Amen.

I want to go back and harvest more harvesters in France.

I'm going to get back over there and pick a fight.

Amen. With the devil.

Hallelujah. But here's the thing, the Lord

said, Brian, if they'll do on purpose what you did on

accident, I'll do what I did and they'll experience the same

thing you did. And again, I'd love to just say,

hey, if you'll come down here, I'll lay hands on you right now

and this will all happen. It won't.

Doesn't happen that way. There's other things that we

received like that. But man, I'm, I'm telling you, I

encourage you try this for three weeks.

I shared this with the pastor in Alabama that was about ready to

quit the ministry. He had tears in his eyes as we

sat there. We were eating and I was sharing

some of these things with him. And he said, Brian, I've needed

this. I've not been doing this.

And then I just so happened he was leading a minister's group

and I I was there. He didn't know I was going to be

there. And he said, Lord, what am I

supposed to share with these ministers?

And he said, what's changed your life the last couple of months?

And he said this. They got it out and shared him

with the ministers. Didn't know I was going to be

there that morning. I just challenge you.

What do you got to? You got nothing to lose.

I don't even charge you for this.

I mean, you know, you already got a Bible.

They don't got to be special. Just take a Bible and start

reading it like this and and send me an e-mail in three weeks

and tell me. Tell me if it doesn't work.

Amen. I'd love to stay longer, but I

I've got to go. So y'all stand up.

Let me pray over and I'll just turn it over to Pastor Earl.

Father, what a privilege it is to be here with these wonderful

people and Saint Augustine, Father and Lord, my hearts cry.

Lord God is that if there's anybody that are dealing with

some of the stuff that I was dealing with, unnecessary

burdens and unnecessary battles. Father God that I challenge

them, Holy Spirit, that you would resonate this in their

hearts tonight. That they'll make some changes

in their life and see the victory, see the negative laid

aside and see them be able to put on the Newman and run their

race and reach their assignment and reach the mission to reach

those around them father in Jesus.

Name. Thank you so much for listening

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