Ministering Unto The Lord!

You're listening to the Cross Kingdom Sermon of the Week. We helped you enjoy

this message from Justin Carpenter. Thank we love y'all. I was starting to

say something first service, and I don't actually think I finished my statement,

but I'm in How many y'all use you Version as a reading app like on

your phones. I've been using that since like twenty eleven, I think,

and I'm going through two plans right now. I've got like twenty five days

left, and one of the plans is Psalms and Proverbs, And somehow I

ended up on Proverbs thirty one today on Mother's Day. I thought that was

interesting because I had not intentionally done that. But I love you Version.

If you all have a hard time staying in the Word daily, I would

highly highly recommend a reading plan. The app is free. I I have,

oh we still need a rose here. I have averaged going through the

Bible one and a half times since like twenty eleven a year, and and

that app just keep you know, it'll give you notifications, and it's really

good for your reading time. That's better than that. People, you should

be excited about the Word of God. Man tough crowd this morning, well

out of curiosity. Who's noticed a uptick in their dream life in a good

way, like good dreams, not just warfare. Yeah, right around somewhere

around three weeks ago, there was a shift. I woke up in the

middle of the night from the dream, from a dream, and I felt

like the Lord said that there was breakthrough because I don't know about y'all.

I was having lots of warfare dreams there for a while. Had a very

interesting dream last night coming into this morning. I was being given a tour

by someone with me I couldn't see their face, and of the Guadalupe River

and we're walking down the you know, the I don't want to say the

shore, but whatever. We're going down the side of the river and there

was a big, a big river or ocean port like I knew it was

the ocean, and it was coming into the Guadalupe and I thought, man,

that's interesting. I was like, this would be an awesome place to

go fishing. Right, So obviously the ocean does not come into the Guadaloupe

and Curveville in case you're wondering geographically, that would be a really long run

for the ocean. But what I do believe it means is that there's a

gate for the nations to come to Currville. And for I don't know,

maybe fifteen years probably fifteen years ago, somewhere around there, the Lord began

to speak to me about this region, and I knew it was called to

be like a modern day Antioch or a Nowpostolic hub. I knew it would

be a safe place in the last days, and but that people would come

in, they would get equipped, they would go out, and and I

through a series of night visions and different things, I knew a small piece

of what the Lord wanted to do. But fishing has to do with evangelism,

right, and the ocean or the seas. If you look at scripture

that that represents the nations or masses of people. This is biblical language.

Go look at your scripture and you'll see. I was talking with Sean earlier

and he just said he felt like this real significant. And Daniel, whatever

a watcher decreed, it could not be changed. And it said it came

by the decree of the watchers. And we were talking earlier, and I

would say that there's been some things decided or decreed in in the last couple

of months concerning the Body of Christ and concerning our country. And I think

that regardless of what happens in the in the coming months, that we are

in the beginnings of seeing very significant things happening in a positive light in the

Body of Christ. I do believe that you're going to consent, continue to

see a dividing of sheep and goats. You're going to continue to see leaders

in the Body of Christ exposed that refused to repent. You're going to continue

to see leaders and other spheres of influence get exposed. You know, the

justice of God can only lay bare in the streets for so long before regardless

of how good or how lawless we are as a nation or a people,

he begins to act for His namesake. And I would say that as a

nation, we don't necessarily deserve anything but judgment. But I also know that

God is slow to anger, and that he doesn't take delight in things being

destroyed. Even in the Old Covenant he said, do I take delight in

the destruction of the wicked? No, I'd rather they repent. And so

we've been given this ministry of reconciliation, and you know it's we're going to

get lots of opportunities in the days ahead to actually love like Jesus. And

you're going to find out where you've been loving out of your soul versus your

spirit in case you hadn't figured it out out yet. The level of love

that God calls us to cannot be accomplished in our souls because it's supernatural.

So if you walk in the flesh, you don't love like Jesus. Period.

It says that the love of many will grow cold in the last days.

And I've said this before, but I think that when we're in a

season or a time of an anti Christ spirit, it's increasing. It's exactly

what's attacked Israel. It's what's been unleashed over our nation. It's the spirit

that is behind all of the pro Palestinian protests that are not peaceful. It's

an anti Christ spirit. It's lawlessness. You don't need a vision or angelic

visitation to realize that God said these things would happen right now. What is

our response going to be. Is it going to be let's call fire down

from heaven. If I see some of you smiling, that makes me very

nervous people. Yes, yes, let's do that. No, Jesus said,

Peter, you don't know what spiriture of you know, when Saul had

his conversion, everyone was scared to death of him, right. They didn't

believe he was that he legitimately was converted. I want to tell you that

I think we're going to see some significant Sauls coming to know the Lord in

the days ahead. Last night I found myself in one of those spaces.

Seriously, I got the same exact time as I had for service. How

that happened? Not knowing what I wanted to what the Lord wanted to teach

on. And I asked my family to pray, and that didn't say anything

to me. We actually Lisa said, she goes, well, I have

an idea, but I don't think you want to hear it. Not true,

babe, Not true anyways. So with the uh, with the remaining

time we have this morning or this afternoon, I want to talk to you

about ministering to the Lord. I've only talked about this one other time,

I think, uh, since the church plant. And if if we don't

get the if this is not the foundation of everything in our lives, then

you're at best you're gonna burn out. It's not that bad already is it?

You're going to end up becoming a professional Christian without it. That means

you learn the talk, you learn the lingo. You're a chameleon. You

can look like everything's great and it's not. The definition or the Hebrew word

is a charrath, and it means to attend as a minial or worshiper figuratively,

to contribute. It means to minister, serve, or wait on.

And I don't know about y'all, but when it comes to like Psalm's forty

six' ten, be still? Is that on the front of your journal?

Awesome? Be still and know that I am God. See, the

Lord's always talking, and he's always wanting to talk. He just doesn't always

want to talk about what you want him to. Did you figure that out

yet? And and when you think you've come to him with a crisis,

he doesn't always think it's a crisis. Did you ever figure that one out?

Too? Lord? We're out of time? Two weeks later, Lord,

we're out of time a month later? Lord, Why have you answered

this? Do you not care? Do you not see the anguish I'm in?

He's like, yeah, and it's working. What does it mean for

us to minister, to serve, to wait on the Lord, because that

is absolutely the key to you actually abiding in love and joy and peace.

It's the key for you to have peace when everyone else is losing it.

It says, let the peace of Christ rule and rain. That means,

in any given circumstance, no matter what's going on in your life, you

can let His peace rule over your mind and heart. Jesus was not pretending

to be asleep in the boat, y'all, and that storm had professional fishermen

scared to death convinced do you not care? We're going to perish? Lord?

He's like, why'd you wake me up for my nap? He literally

was sleeping in the storm. How big of a storm can you sleep in?

What will determine that is the depth of your intimacy with him? In

case you hadn't figured it out yet Another caveat trust is built by time.

The more time we spend with someone, the more trust we build, or

at least it's supposed to work that way, right Luke seven thirty seven to

fifty and behold a woman of the city who was a sinner when she learned

that he was reclining at table in the Pharisees house, brought an alabaster flask

of ointment, and standing behind him at his feet weeping, she began to

wet his feet with her tears and wipe them with the hair of her head,

and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment. I told first

service, Lisa was making fun of my toes last night. I was like,

you know what, she probably won't be anointing my feet, or her

washing them or kissing my feet anytime soon. Now. When the Pharisees who

had invited him saw this, he said to himself, if this man were

a prophet, he would have known who and what sort of woman this is

who's touching him, for she's a sinner. Make it modern day, how

many of you would feel comfortable walking into most churches. See. The one

thing that I count as the biggest honor is that anyone from any walk of

life, no matter what they've gone through, can walk into this house and

feel family. But the religious doesn't like that. They want to judge everything,

but they don't want to be judged. Don't judge me, I know,

Can I get an interpretation for that? And Jesus answering, said to

him, Simon I have something to say to you, And he answered,

say it, teacher. A certain money lender who had two debtors, one

owed five hundred denari and the other fifty. When they could not pay,

he canceled the debt of both. Now which of them will love him more?

Simon answered directly, this time the one I suppose, for whom he

canceled the larger debt, And he said to him, you've judged rightly.

Then, turning toward the woman, he said to Simon, do you see

this woman I entered your house. You gave me no water for my feet,

but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her

hair. You gave me no kiss. Remember in scripture it says greet each

other with a holy kiss. That's not really in our culture today. You

know what I'm saying. But yep. Moving on, and he says,

you gave me no kiss, But from the time I came in, she's

not ceased to kiss my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil,

but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore, I tell you

her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much.

But he who is forgiven little loves little, and he said to her,

your sins are forgiven. Then those who are at the table with him begin

to say among themselves, who is this who even forgives sins? And he

said to the woman, your faith has saved you go in peace. I

want to tell you one of the dangers of walking with Jesus for a long

period of time is we can actually forget what we've been saved from. We

can begin to puff up and forget what we were pulled out of. And

if we're not careful, we can actually find ourselves judging people in the very

sin that used to entangle us. And it's a slow burn. It happens

because we lose the posture at being at his feet and not caring who's in

the room. Because when that woman walked into the room, guess what,

she wasn't worried about how many Pharisees were there, how many sad you sees

were there, how many scribes were there, how many popular people were there,

how many gifted people were there. She wasn't worried about any of that

because her eyes were focused on Jesus. And she went in and began to

minister with her tears to the Lord. You know, it says every tear

we've ever cried is in a bottle. If you all look back there.

Deanna's got that picture and there's like a water, a puddle of tears in

front of her. She actually painted that of herself, and there's a little

bottle in there, and it says redeemed. See, there's honestly even a

place of intercession where your tears become ministry. Jeremiah was called the weeping prophet.

Do we know how much we've been forgiven of? Or do we judge

our sin? Do we compare each other? Compare my sin that I was

forgiven of to your sin? And says when we compare each other or compare

one another, that we're not wise. Jesus is our standard. He's the

standard of holiness. Just because you may be walking a little bit better than

someone next to you means nothing, means there's an opportunity to potentially maybe help

them get out of the ditch. You who are spiritual, go and restore

such a one. But take heed lest you too be tempted. Are y

all with me Luke ten twenty seven, And he answered, you should love

the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul,

with all your strength, with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.

We see a love in the acts of the Apostles, in the Book

of Acts that I think is very rare. I think that we're in many

ways trying to get back there. You know, we talk about, you

know, in greater things than this we will do because he returned to the

Father. And I think in many ways that the truth is we need to

just get back to or get to a place of living the life that he

lived. Rather than visiting power, rather than visiting miracles, we actually live

a life of intimacy where those things are constantly following us as a stamp from

heaven because we're leading with the Gospel of the Kingdom. See, you're seeing

the celebrity Christian torn down right now. You're seeing leaders in the body of

Christ who refuse to repent and were full of spiritual abuse, and the Lord

has said I'm done. They're just like the pastors in Jeremiah where he rebuked

those shepherds. We've got to get back into a place where being at his

feet is the focal point that nothing no matter. Listen, y'all, even

when we come together corporately on Sunday morning. What is the motivation when you

come in? What is the number one thing that you're looking forward to?

If it's to see each other, your motives are wrong. Not that that's

a bad thing, but it should be. Jesus and Acts thirteen. It

says there were prophets and teachers. They were gathered together, and as they

ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, now separate to

me, Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I've called them. Notice

what was going on when the call came. They were in a place of

fasting and prayer and ministering to the Lord, and then the Holy Spirit spoke.

They weren't petitioning him to speak a certain word, or they weren't looking

for him to do a specific thing. But in the midst of being aligned

and intimacy with him, a call came. You know, Lisa, years

ago, Lisa looked at me, she goes, what are you waiting for,

like an angelic visitation before you start going after this? And I looked

at her and I said, well, maybe that's where my mindset was.

Yeah, that wouldn't hurt an angel come wham, and it was actually rich.

That kind of encouraged me way back when to start taking steps of faith.

And you know what was interesting, It was when I actually started moving

forward by faith towards the things that I had. You know, I knew

clear enough to go towards. It was in the going that all of a

sudden, all these other things begin to happen. I did have an angelic

visitation, I did have visions, I did have dreams, and revelation was

released, but it was released as I was going. Listen, the law

of promotion in scripture is what you stewart will grow. So some of you,

if you're sitting around waiting for an angelic visitation, stop it, Take

the revelation you got from the Lord, and begin to walk forward. Are

you with me? You may never get an angelic visitation, last time I

checked. You can't order those. You don't pull up to the drive through

of heaven. Hey, I'm at Saint our Bucks. I need see.

That was a decent dad joke. Only when I get under the anointing,

the jokes get better. You know what I mean. I'm trying, folks,

I'll keep going. I don't want to crash after that one. If

you look at script if you look at the whole canon of scripture, it

was the men of God that kept ministering unto the Lord as their priority that

seemed to be used in significant ways. Samuel, his mother couldn't, couldn't

get, couldn't have a child. And she shows up. They're doing their

yearly sacrifice and she's over there in anguish, murmuring in all this, and

Eli at this point is so dull. He's like, woman, put your

alcohol, you know. He thinks she's drunk, And of course she was

not drunk. She was in anguish over the fact that she was barren.

She goes, no, sir, I'm not I've not been drinking, and

she explains everything, and he goes, well, may the Lord grant you

a child? And guess what Samuel shows up. It says as soon as

Samuel was weaned, she lent him to the Lord, and so Samuel grows

up. So, in case you're wondering when being weaned as a child,

back then, it wasn't like a year old or a year and a half

old, because they didn't drive down to Walmart and grab some baby formula and

put a bottle in their mouth, so the breastfeeding process lasted a lot longer.

They say that Samuel was roughly five years of age when the word of

the Lord was revealed to him, but he grew up. She would bring

a change of clothes every single year when she'd go up, and he grew

up in the house of the Lord, ministering to the Lord. Listen,

your number one job, regardless of what you do, whether you're a school

teacher or a police officer and attorney, whatever it is, your number one

thing to do is to minister to the Lord, to wait on the Lord.

Some of y'all are in a divine frustration. You don't know it because

you've been ministering more to yourself than the Lord, and he's not blessing it,

and you think somehow he's against you. First Samuel two eighteen and nineteen.

Samuel was ministering before the Lord, a boy clothed with a linid ephod

and his mother used to make for him a little robe and take it to

him each year when she went up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice.

I was just looking at pictures, Micah. He was so little.

Everybody's like, what happened to your son, he's huge. In fact,

I saw I ran into a teacher yesterday at ATB and she's like, man,

Micah's gotten huge. And she made a joke about my boys looking down

on them, you know, And I'm like, I resemble that. And

I worked really hard, y'all to hit six foot tall. I mean like

I was trying to will it when I was a kid. My whole goal,

I kid you not honest truth, My whole goal was to get to

hit six foot tall. I just missed it. I mean so frustrating.

I mean, just so close. Platform shoes cold. Can I borrow those

platform shoes? But you understand something that Samuel, apart from Jesus, Samuel

was literally the only prophet that said none of the words that he spoke fell

to the ground. What does that mean? He's a whole lot better than

the American prophets, especially the ones that refused to repent. That's another teaching.

But none of the words that he spoke fell to the ground. And

I love this because from you know, teaching in the prophetic and equipping in

the prophetic. I get naysayers every once in a while, believe it or

not, And even people that say, oh, it's not biblical to train

people to prophesy. Really go to first Samuel, he's ministering to the Lord,

and it says, and the word of the Lord was revealed to him,

it said, had had not yet been revealed to him. So in

the middle of the night, Samuel, roughly five years old, here's this

voice calls his name. Samuel goes to Eli and says, Eli, what

do you want? He goes, I didn't call you, y'all. If

God's voice did not sound like Eli in that moment, Samuel would have gone

over there be like Eli, somebody's in my room. No, he heard

Eli's voice, but it was actually the Lord calling him, and Eli was

a little dull at this point. And this takes place three different times.

Finally he recognizes that the Lord is calling him, and after ad he goes,

if you hear it again, say speak for your servant is listening.

What was that? Oh? My word? Eli just mentored Samuel in hearing

the voice of the Lord. This is why you have Jericho and Gilgaal and

Jordan and Bethel. These were all the schools of the prophets, where the

sons of the Prophets were, where Elijah visited before he was taken up,

and every one of these locations they said, do you know you're the Lord's

going to take your master today? And Elisha was like, yes, I

know, shut up paraphrase. But he knew he was going to be taken.

And do you understand in that moment there was a test from the Lord.

You know, we're constantly being tested for promotion. And I want to

say that how you handle adversity is one of the greatest tests that will determine

how much responsibility you're going to be able to carry in the kingdom. Listen,

offenses will come. I guarantee you if you spend enough time with anybody

in this room, they're going to irritate you. No, for real,

it's gonna happen. How fast we forgive actually tells you how mature you are.

See, there's people out there that will tell you that forgiveness needs to

be drawn out and take a long time. You need to flog yourself to

prove your forgiveness. That's nothing more than secular humanism. Forgiveness four hundred and

seventy times in a day, forgive, forgive, forgive, or four ninety

The point is we forgive we forgive. We forgive, and you forgive to

the degree that you want to be forgiven, because if you don't forgive,

neither are you forgiven. I think one of the greatest things that we can

do is actually see Christ in each of us, because every one of you

are made in His image. Right Peter, Jesus asked Peter, do you

love me more than these feed my lambs? Do you love me more than

these my sheep? Do you love me more than these tend my sheep?

There are so many things fighting for the affections of our heart today. Did

you know, even because of algorithms, when you get on social media,

if you start looking at something, some of y'all think it's prophetic. Oh

man, I can't believe how all look at all of a sudden, all

these videos are coming up. Yes, people, it's called an algorithm.

They're feeding you what you want to see. Ah, Lisa gets when I

hit a crescendoing of fatigue. I like mindless entertainment. That entertainment consists of

YouTube, two major things, well two major things, and she's rolling her

eyes right now, y'all. I love watching strong men, like the contests

where they pick up the are y'all with me. You know, they're taking

those circus dumbbells and benching them and deadlifting a thousand. I love. I've

lifted weights, not that you can tell, but I've lifted for decades and

uh and I really enjoy lifting and way way, way, way, way

way back. I even did two bodybuilding shows in late high school. Yeah

I know, yep. Now it's body by donuts anyways, but I will

just totally check out and I'll watch that or food eating contests, and so

last night I was watching a food eating at least it was like, if

I have to watch one more weightlifter, are one more skinny man eating ten

pounds of food? She goes, I'm done. I'm done. That's what

this is where we're at. People. I apologize, but Romans twelve says,

this is the amplified. It says, I appeal to you there for

brethren, and beg of you, in view of all the mercies of God,

to make a decisive dedication of your bodies, presenting all your members and

faculties as a living sacrifice, holy, devoted, consecrated and well pleasing to

God, which is your reasonable, rational, intelligent service and spiritual worship y'all.

Even according to Hebrews one fourteen, the angels are called men string spirits.

It says, are they not all ministering spirits sent out to serve for

the sake of those who will inherit salvation? Paul told the Corinthians, do

you not know that Christ is in you? Do you know? He rebuked

them? He says, you're acting as mere men. Do you not know

you'll that you'll judge angels? What is wrestling for the affection of your heart?

Today? And if he says, do you love me more than these?

What have you? What have you been used as a fleshly pacifier instead

of coming to the Holy Spirit for comfort? And when you walk into a

room, are you looking for Jesus? Are you looking for the accolades of

men? Are you looking for the praises of men? Proverb says everyone will

praise you when you do well, But it's a slippery slope because of that.

If you live for that identity, the moment they're not pleased with you,

you'll die. Wayne, Can I get you to y'all? There's when

we are really walking in intimacy with the Lord. No one sees it is

the secret place. Your prayer life is built in the secret place. No

one's there, there's no social media. You unmuted Sean, Sean was sleeping.

It's okay. It's the intimacy that is cultivated in the secret place that

is going to allow you in the day is ahead to stand. It's the

intimacy with Him that's gonna be a shield over your heart from the fear in

the coming days. It says that men's hearts will fail them for fear.

Yeah, if you turn the news on, it's not really encouraging right now,

is it? Like? There's nothing encouraging about any of the news right

now, not that there has been in decades. But we all we see

is a culture that has lost their minds. It's like looney tunes, like

we saw the porky the pig. Do you not know that Christ is in

you? There's never been a time. Now more than ever you have the

answer. But the question is have you allowed other things to get in the

way of being at His feet? The average pastor spends fifteen minutes a day

in prayer. Yeah wow. Ninety percent of the Body of Christ will never

share their faith, and the ten percent that does has not for six months

on average. Y'all. There are simple things that have to change in us,

and I want to tell you that they would change if we would actually

be at his feet and make that a priority. We wouldn't have to check

off the boxes. We wouldn't have to suffer through prayer when it became our

delight. I just want to encourage y'all to remember what the Lord has saved

you from. Too much. As to whom much is forgiven, they love

much, and I always I think it's I think it's a great opportunity for

us to examine our lives and say, Lord, what am I loving more

than you? Because we've all done it, y'all. I'm not throwing.

I'm throwing. If I was throwing stones, it would be in a glasshouse,

would be broke. But we're every one of you. Look around.

You're gonna spend all of eternity with each other. Whether you like it or

not, It's true. We're going to spend all of eternity together. Could

you imagine what it's going to be like when billions of people are gathered in

oneness with an innumerable number of angels worshiping the creator of the universe. If

you're listen. I am an introverted extrovert. I recharge alone, but I

like being around people. I just can't recharge with you. Does that make

sense? But we're going to be around each other for eternity millions of people,

y'all. So if you don't like being around a lot of people,

get over it. Because God's into Megachurch. He is. Peter preaches,

three thousand people came to know the Lord in one day. Suck it up,

Buttercup, learn how to love. Bob Jones died in the seventies.

He stood before Jesus and he asked him one thing, did you learn to

love? And that is the greatest test for every single one of us on

planet Earth. Have we really learned to love? Or do we only love

the ones that we see ourselves inside of? Because that is the ingredients for

clicks and then schisms and discord and all sorts of fleshly garbage. Let's stand

the prayer team would come forward. Please thank you for listening. For more

messages and other resources, please subscribe to this podcast or go to our website

at www dot Cross Kingdom dot org.