Chosen Vessel

Let's turn in our bibles to Acts, chapter nine, and I want to encourage you with these words Acts, chapter nine, starting verse 10.

This, of course, is after Saul of Tarsus, apostle Paul, was saved on the road to Damascus, verse 10,.

And there was a certain disciple at Damascus named Ananias, and to him said the Lord in a vision.

Ananias, he said, behold, I'm here, lord.

The Lord said unto him arise and go into the street which is called Strait, and inquire in the house of Judas for one called Saul of Tarsus.

For behold, he prayeth and hath seen in a vision a man named Ananias coming in and putting his hand on him that he might receive his sight.

Then Ananias answered Lord, I've heard by many of this man how much evil he hath done to the saints at Jerusalem and here he hath authority from the chief priest to bind all that call on my name.

But the Lord said unto him go thy way, for he is a chosen vessel unto me.

Everybody shout chosen vessel, he's a chosen vessel unto me to bear my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel, and I will show him how great things he must suffer for my namesake.

Ananias went his way and entered into the house and, putting his hands on him, said brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way as thou came, ist hath sent me that thou mightest receive thy sight and be filled with a holy ghost.

And immediately there fell from his eyes, as it had been scales, and he received sight forthwith and arose and was baptized.

And when he had received meat he was strengthened.

Then was Saul certain days with the disciples which were at Damascus and straight way he preached Christ in the synagogues that he is the Son of God.

Now let's look at verse 15 again.

Jesus said he is a chosen vessel unto me to bear my name, and so I just wanted to encourage you with this message chosen vessels, we're all, all of us, chosen vessels and it's our day to reach our generation.

Paul had to reach his generation in his day and it's up to each of us, individually and of course, together, corporately, to reach our generation today.

I mean, he's giving us the mandate, he's message, the manifestation for this time, for this day.

You know we can't copy what happened yesterday.

A lot of people try to just copy.

They don't want to hear from God anything fresh, they want to.

They don't want to get God's plans, purposes and pursues.

Brother, brother Hagan, wrote a tremendous book.

I think we have it in the media center.

But if we don't, we've had it before, linda saying yes, we've got it.

And you know it does no good to just copy somebody else.

You can't with this church, can't copy some other church.

We can't look down the internet, oh, they're doing this over there.

Let's do that.

We, we.

You know we've got the message, we've got the mandate, we've got the manifestation for this time in this generation.

We can't copy Finney and Wesley and West.

You know Whitfield and Lake or Seymour, daddy Seymour.

You know we can admire their faith, we can admire their time, we can admire what they did in their generation.

We can't even copy Osteen and Hagan and our Roberts.

We can admire them too and really in a sense we stand on the shoulders of these generals of the faith.

We've learned from them, we've received from them, we've had an impartation from them.

But we've got to receive grace to reach our generation now.

This generation has never been another like it.

They're not the same as previous generation.

They don't respond in the same way as previous generations.

If we ignore that, then we do it, you know, to the harm and the hurt of God's plan that he has for this generation, and I believe this is a terminal generation.

I call it that because I believe this this is generation is gonna see the coming of the Lord and they're either gonna be ready or they're not.

I said they're either gonna be ready to see Him or they're not, and if they're not, it'll be too late for them.

There's no tomorrows.

Sounds kind of hard, doesn't it?

But I don't mean it to be that way.

I just what I really mean is for us to recognize that we're people of destiny and as we were, we were worshiping Him.

As we were worshiping Him, the honor of His name.

We bear the same name, we have the same gospel, they have the same message, but we have to hear God's plans and His purposes for us.

We have to pursue what it is that he has for this generation.

Now we've been equipped and we're being equipped now, hallelujah.

I look around and I see some of the people that have turned and believed lies, preaching lies, practicing lies, joined in with the woke, join in with the world, let the world in, let the influence of the world and their ministries, people that we used to respect, people that we used to listen to, people that did a lot of good previously.

But you know my Bible.

It talks a lot about people that have you know Demas.

Demas was a right hand to Paul and Demas has departed, having loved this present world.

I mean, you know, think about Barnabas.

I don't know that Barnabas went into sin, but Barnabas did depart over a family member who later became useful to Paul.

So what about the family member is about an attitude that developed.

Are you with me now?

So here we see in the book of Acts that God chose Saul of Tarsus, a very unlikely candidate, persecuting the church, hailing many off to death, held the garments of those who stoned.

Stephen was right, there had no mercy, was, you know, had no mercy on him.

And yet something happened during that stoning and it, you know, something real happened.

He saw Stephen's face, as it were an angel.

I was talking about the fire of God this morning.

I was talking about the light of God that shines through some people.

It ought to shine through all of the church.

It ought to shine through you and I.

We ought to have such an accountants that when people see us they just go.

They're startled More than a few people were startled at Moses.

He spent some time up on the mount with God.

He had to put a veil over his face.

He was so bright, hallelujah and a nice it doubts.

He said hey, you know who you're talking about, this guy.

You really want me to go see him.

He was kind of afraid.

He was afraid he'd get hauled off to the who's gal.

He said Jesus, don't you know about him.

Don't look so innocent.

You know you've asked the same question.

He said go your way.

He's a chosen vessel unto me.

I'm going to show him how blessed he's going to be.

I'm going to show him how much people are going to like him.

He's going to be the president of the Rotary Club and the Lines Club.

I'm going to elect him president of the universe.

He said I'm going to show him what great things he's going to suffer for my name's sake.

That name is a plumb line.

That name is a rock of offense.

Two out of half the people you're going to see, you start talking about the name.

You can talk about the man upstairs.

You can talk about God, you can talk about the Lord, but when you start using his name, you start talking about Jesus.

He says hold this, let's marry him.

Yes, let's look at 2 Corinthians, chapter 12.

2 Corinthians 12 · chapter mention

Verse 7, paul is talking about.

He wouldn't even claim it was him.

He talked about going to heaven.

He said I don't even know if it was me, I don't know if I was in my body, out of my body, I can't tell.

Verse 7, and lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, this is the epistles that Paul wrote about 80% of the New Testament he received by revelation.

One Bible scholar said that the Pauline revelation is what Jesus took when he went to heaven.

He ascended into heaven.

It went to heaven with him unuttered.

He couldn't teach the 12.

He couldn't teach them this because it was above them.

He had to wait and he had to give it to Paul so he could bring along this revelation of righteousness, which is by faith.

We tend to think the apostles all had it all figured out.

They didn't have much figured out.

They knew Jesus.

They knew a lot of things, but all Paul taught them all.

Peter even said you know, some of this stuff is hard to understand.

He wasn't a Bible scholar, he's a fisherman.

He didn't study at the feet of Gimeliel, he didn't have the education Paul had.

He didn't have the mind Paul had, so he had to get it by revelation too.

And he did, didn't he?

They all did, unless I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations there was given to me a thorn in the flesh.

Oh, the thorn in the flesh.

Religion tells you it's sickness.

Religion tells you that if Paul, oh, he was sick and God gave him a thorn in the flesh, it did number one.

It doesn't say God gave it to him, who did give it to him?

Well, you know, it depends on what your revelation is about.

What is the thorn in the flesh?

He tells you right here.

There was a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me.

Unless I should be exalted above measure.

Who was against him being exalted?

The devil was.

And everywhere in the Bible, when you look up thorn and go back, you'll read Exodus and you'll read numbers and it's talking about people.

So persecution was the thorn in the flesh, persecution, I mean, you know, everywhere Paul went, the Jews would follow him and go into next town.

He was sent to the Gentiles and he, they would go into the next town and stir up insurrection and everything.

And they.

You know, they just stir up a controversy.

And so Paul admits for this thing, what thing?

This thorn in the flesh, this persecution.

It dogged his tracks.

From his standpoint, it seemed like it hindered his ministry.

It seemed like the Democrat just kept getting it, you know, reelected term after term after term.

They kept passing all kind of crazy laws.

And for this thing I basalt the Lord thrice that it might depart from me.

And Jesus said unto me my grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness.

Let's see people read that and they just take it wrong.

They don't rightly divide the word of truth.

You know, if you don't rightly.

You see, if it's rightly divided, it can be wrongly divided.

And it's been wrongly divided for 2,000 years.

I've heard this kind of preaching.

I've heard people can't stand up on the radio and on television and preach it wrong.

And is there any wonder that people just don't even know what it means?

Jesus did not say I want you to suffer.

He did not say I'd like it, it makes me glad to see you suffer.

He did not say that I'm allowing you to suffer.

He stated it as a fact.

I'm going to show him.

He's going to have to go through this.

He's going to have to go through the suffering Because why?

He's bearing my name, and the devil hates it and he will work all day and night against you, just like he is us.

Oh God, let this cup pass from me, take this thorn away from me.

Is that you don't need anything?

All you need is to access my grace.

Grace is not given into it.

Well, brother, you just need to embrace the suffering.

You just need, you need to cope.

Well, I give you coping skills.

We're going to grant you coping skills so you can cope with the persecution.

Now, grace you know, when you look up grace, grace is the divine influence on the heart.

I believe that.

But grace is much more than that.

Grace is God's power to do anything.

And what is available to you, paul, is at the end of your human effort, when you get to the end of yourself.

You can always access my grace through faith, and that grace will see you through whatever the devil throws at you.

And I'm telling you, you chosen vessels, god's grace is going to see us through every difficulty that we face If we'll just keep our faith switch turned on.

Well, you know, god's in control.

No, he's not, we are.

He's in ultimate control, he's in overall control, but we and what we say out of our mouth is what matters.

He had to have an attitude adjustment.

He's waiting on God to do something about the persecution.

God said you just need my grace.

Access my grace through faith, because when you get to the end of your weenie and out and all your human effort and all your tears and all your whining and crying, he said there's my grace, can make you stand strong.

See, he's stealing your spine.

It's kind of a continuation from this morning.

A little bit Glory to God.

Come on, lift your hands right now.

Thank you, lord, for that grace.

We have access by grace into this, by faith, into this grace and where we stand and rejoice in the glory of God, hallelujah.

That's why we can rejoice.

You know how many of you could tell Paul wasn't rejoicing right here.

He's kind of crying, he's kind of got a you know pity party going.

And who could?

I mean you can't blame him on one kind.

I mean you know he had a lot of, he suffered a lot.

Then he said most gladly, therefore, well, I'd rather glory in my infirmities that the power of Christ may rest on me.

He got the secret.

He tapped into the grace.

He tapped into the way that when they stoned him to death, he had a staff that circled around him and prayed him and he got up and walked right back into the same city that brought him out of town.

I mean, who can do that?

He did.

Oh, I'm back, I'll be back.

Can you imagine what they did when he walked back into town?

They left him for dead.

They stoned him to death.

They know about death.

They know how to stone people to death.

They do, they had a lot of practice at that.

And then he gets up and walks back into town.

They're a worst nightmare.

My strength is perfected when you reach the end of your human ability.

That's why we need his ability and we're tapping, and we're learning how to tap into that grace more and more.

Right now.

God has chosen us.

We are chosen vessels.

We're not random, we didn't just.

We're not an accident of nature.

We're not just.

We just didn't pop out of the, out of the mama, you know, at this point in time, just random, oh, yeah, okay.

Well, you, you won the end time lottery.

Here you are.

No, god planned it.

People of destiny.

Let's turn back to John 15.

Jesus said to the disciples in verse 16, you've not chosen me, but I've chosen you and ordained you that you should go and bring forth fruit and that your fruit should remain, and that whatsoever you shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.

There's that name again, that powerful name.

No one else has a right to use that name and most everybody I listened to on television use the name in vain dirty dog.

We honor that name, we revere that name, we bear that name, we Praise God.

You've heard me say this but he doesn't qualify the call, he doesn't call the qualified, he qualifies the called.

People get that all confused.

They think the calling is the qualification.

The calling is just the beginning, it's a seed.

Let's look at 1 Corinthians 1.

Just encouraging you tonight, because we're under attack, and I don't say it to make you a victim.

I say it to empower you to access this grace.

Wherein we stand, it's through faith.

Faith has to call things, faith has to speak things.

Faith has to believe things in their heart.

We have to believe it, we have to speak it, we have to access it, otherwise we just whine and cry and become the same victim mentality that's in the world.

All of them are victims out there.

They're all poor little old victims.

Oh, I've been so mistreated, and welcome to the mistreatment club.

We've all been mistreated, we've all been betrayed, we've all been kicked in the face at time or two, maybe more than a time or two some cases.

That's why you're so funny looking.

I'm just joking, all right.

First Corinthians, chapter one, verse 25, because the foolishness of God is wiser than men and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

For you see your calling brethren, everybody say I am called.

You see your calling brethren.

How that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called.

But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise.

And God has chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty and base things of the world and things which are despised have God chosen, and things which are not to bring to naught, things that are that no flesh should glory in His presence.

So he doesn't call the qualified, he calls the foolish, he calls the weak, he calls the base, he calls the people that are unqualified, and then he begins His work on them, he begins to perfect them, he begins to teach them, he begins to lead them along until they're no longer foolish, they're no longer base, they're no longer weak.

You're not weak anymore.

You have the Word of God, you've accessed the Word, you're full of the Holy Ghost.

You're no longer that person.

But when we first get called, that's what we are.

You know, when God called Oral Roberts, he had, you know, tuberculosis coughing up blood.

When God called John Osteen, he's just a little guy, little scrawny guy with a big voice, selling newspapers on the corner.

You go back and look at these giants of the faith.

I mean, in the natural they were nothing, burgers but God made them something.

God put His touch on them, god inserted Himself in them and they bore that name, the name of Jesus.

You get anything out of this tonight.

I just want to encourage you.

I want you to know you have a sense of destiny.

You're not just a paper cup floating on the seas of life.

You know you're not victims or yeah, we had an election.

It was disappointing to see how many.

You know.

People voted the wrong way, but we're going to keep going.

We're going to keep doing our job.

Second Corinthians four let's look at that one.

That's a good, good one to read.

I want to encourage you.

Verse six, for God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

But we have this treasure in earthen vessels.

What we have is a treasure that the excellency of the power might be of God and not of us.

You would think everything would be peachy, keen, rosy, wonderful.

But look at what he says in the next verse.

We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed.

We are perplexed but not in despair, persecuted but not forsaken, cast down but not destroyed, always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.

Glory to God.

Later he says verse 17,.

For our light of fiction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.

Hallelujah, oh hallelujah.

We take the long view.

We're not in this thing for the short term.

I see a lot of people so short-sighted, they sell out, they back up, they bow down to this world system.

Not us, no, we've accessed this grace by faith and we're standing and rejoicing Hallelujah.

Let's look at Luke 16.

Getting anything out of this, he said.

If, therefore, you have not been faithful in the unrighteous, let's back up and look at verse 10.

He that is faithful in that which is leased is faithful also in much.

He that is unjust in the leased is unjust also in much.

If, therefore, you have not been faithful in the unrighteous, men are riches.

If you're not faithful over the money that God has given you, because it's not yours, it's his and he just we're stewards over everything.

You're not faithful over that, who will commit to your trust?

The true riches, see, that's the treasure we have in these earthen vessels.

It's the anointing, it's God's power, it's that name that, when we use it, god hears and he grants what we're used in that name for, whether it's healing or deliverance for ourselves or somebody else.

Well, there's finances that we have to have.

He wants us to bear fruit.

He's ordained that we go and bear fruit.

They're all with me now.

So we have to be faithful.

The true riches, the treasures in these earthen vessels.

So then the anointing of the Holy Ghost.

We have to become yielded vessels.

I like what Catherine Cooman used to say.

She said you know, god's not looking for silver vessels, he's not looking for gold vessels, he's looking for yielded vessels.

Everybody say I'm a yielded vessel, I've been chosen.

Yeah, persecution, tribulation, false accusation, hardship, disappointment, betrayal all these things come with the territory.

We've only gotten into the edges of what I think is going to be happening here in the next while before Jesus comes.

I think it's going to get a lot worse.

I'm saying it not to make you sad or fearful.

I'm just preparing you that we've got to keep that name and we've got to keep that confidence in him that he will give us the grace, no matter when we get all the way to the end of our human strength.

And it just looks like you know what I just man.

This is hard to take.

This is my best friend for 30 years and they've just turned their back on me.

This is what's going on right now.

The families are turning their backs on us.

The White House put out talking points to help people come against their family members.

Did you see that?

Here's what you can say.

And, as all lies, every lie they put in there in print.

They gave it out to people so they could get the upper hand on their relatives.

They want to destroy families, they want to rip them apart.

Well, jesus basically said the same thing.

He said you're going to have to choose.

He that loveth his father and mother and his brother and sister more than me, he's not worthy of me.

I don't know if it'll get down to that in your particular case, but I'm telling you in this church there's going to be some of those choices.

Does that mean God gave up on you?

For now, god's not going to give up on your family.

I'm just saying, though you can't put your family above God.

You can't put your families above God.

Deception and the fact that they're deceived ahead of the truth that you have.

You've got to hold on to it.

Let's lift our hands right now.

Oh, that name, that wonderful name, that beautiful name that we bear.

It's a powerful name, but it's a name that's a plumb line.

It is a rock of offense.

We have to understand that.

Hora ba katasipare kothori atashata.

When we're suffering like this, we ought to just say you know, lord, it's just an honor to suffer.

Shame for your name.

It's what the disciples did when we're lied about, denigrated, gossiped about stories made up out of whole.

I mean, I've had stories, completely false stories, made up out of you know, it's all right.

Sheila Jackson Lee said yesterday that sticks and that words can actually break your bones.

I see some of those Democrat words.

I just say, oh, they don't apply to me.

You know, I'm bouncing those back at you.

Everything you're saying is true of you.

Glory to God.

Let's lift our hands.

Father.

We thank you tonight that we've been chosen for such a time as this.

We're honored to have this treasure in earth and vessels.

Lord, you know how we are, you know how we're wired, you know our weaknesses.

Some of us are being tested, not by you, but by the enemy, looking for a way in looking for a way to stop the ministries that we have, to get us to back off of what we believe, back off of the good news that we carry and the name that we bear, trying to get us to be quiet, trying to get us to be silent, trying to attack us.

But, lord, we're strong.

In the Lord and the power of His might, we are more than conquerors.

Through Him, who loved us, and the greater one lives in us to put us over in every situation.

We thank you, father, for it.

We will not bend and we will not bow.

We will accomplish our ministry in these last days.