Commissioned Champions

Welcome to Gateway Churches Podcast.

Wherever you're tuning in from, we hope you're encouraged by today's message.

So, the title of today, I've never had to prepare a message because I normally simply preach the gospel.

And I love that.

I just love that.

But as part of the giants of the faith this summer, I had to prepare.

So you ready?

Because I'm ready.

All right.

Commissioned champions of God is what we're talking about.

Commissioned champions.

Everyone say you're champion.

I love Apostle Paul, where he says, We're gonna run the race as if we're going to what?

Win the prize.

Do you know what that means?

You're first, you run as if you're going to win.

And it's really interesting that I could tell you here's the truth.

Everyone say the truth.

The truth.

If you give me a guitar up here and I pluck a string, I technically played guitar.

But I will never be a guitar player.

Are you with me?

Some of us go to church and say I'm a Christian.

And we bing.

Wasn't that awesome?

The first point, I know we do three points every week.

I've been watching, man.

It's awesome.

This thing called structure.

Holy Spirit breathe.

Number one, commissioned champions.

Ready, ready, ready, ready?

Pray.

I love the word ray in pray.

You know, we pray more when we need God more.

I mean, if if you if you if you are honest, generally speaking, we pray more.

We are a little bit more still.

We're at kind of a bay of our own plans, and then we have to lean on him a bit more.

It's amazing, actually, what I realized with being born without limbs, how easy it is to be a consumerism Christian and walking with God, talking with God and hoping for a better day.

Nothing wrong with that.

Nothing wrong with me praying for arms and legs.

I have a pair of shoes in my closet in case he gives me arms and legs.

I do.

And I've seen blind people seeing deaf people here, and lame people walking crooked backs come straight.

But dude, are you serious?

Arms and legs are gonna give me arthritis later on anyway.

Who cares?

I don't need arms and legs to stand in front of the gates of hell and redirect traffic.

I don't need a miracle.

I have the miracle.

Ephesians 6 12.

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.

We pray because when we pray, angels come to fight the war that we know we can't fight.

When someone steals money, it's got nothing to do with them.

It's demons.

God gives you wisdom to keep that at bay that they never hurt you again.

You forgive them if they steal my money.

It's not your money, it's God's money anyway.

You don't think he's gonna get revenge?

No, in fact, you know what God wants?

He wants their blindness to be open to the evil that they think they actually have to take money from someone to feel better or have something that they don't have now.

That is why we are commanded to even pray for our enemies, not kill them, pray for them.

Because it's not wishing any enemy of mine to ever go to hell.

Do you understand?

Ask my wife, FBI, bomb squad at our home, grenade.

Yeah.

When people go after you, when you understand that greater is he that is in you than anyone in the world, unto death I stand on truth.

Unto death, Jesus is Lord, and I'll tell you that when fear comes in you, F-E-A-R, false evidence appearing real, that your problem's bigger than God, he can fix this.

Fear that your enemy out there is bigger than your God, no.

F-A-I-T-H, full assurance in the heart that despite what you know, despite what you see, despite what you feel, you believe because God said, God said, I will never allow you to go through more than you can handle.

My grace is sufficient.

Romans 8 28, all things come together for the good for those who love him.

Philippians 4 13 says, For I can endure all things through Christ who strengthens me.

It's not about I can achieve everything through Jesus, I can endure.

Not just on a bad day, pray on a good day.

What do we pray?

What do we pray for?

When was the last time we prayed for our friends and family who have been even invited by you to church?

Is church the only place they're ever gonna find Jesus Christ, or has God put you in their life to number one pray?

And I want you to know prayer works.

Prayer works.

Keep praying, keep seeking.

You're waiting on God for something good, keep seeking.

In Jeremiah 29, verse 11, he's got a plan, hope, and a future.

Jeremiah 29:11

Then you will call upon me, come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.

You will seek me and find me when you search for me with all your heart.

My brothers and sisters, he says, I will be found by you.

I love you, and I know that you're going through a storm right now.

But if you just pray, that ray of light can come through the storm, and until the storm passes, I'm gonna hold you, I'm gonna protect you, and don't worry, just a few more weary days ahead, and you'll fly away.

We pray, we pray for nations, we pray, pray for your marriage, pray for your children, even write down your prayer list.

Who are the people that we haven't prayed for for a while?

Oh, I I struggle with praying.

Even write down a prayer list, prayer works, and I want to encourage you today that sometimes God doesn't make sense, and sometimes circumstances don't change.

And one day I'll either die of cancer or old age.

I don't care how I die, I don't care.

Because guess what?

I ain't dying.

I ain't dying, I don't care.

I'll pray for my cancer to be gone, and if I die of cancer, hallelujah, thank you, Jesus.

I'm going home.

I fly home.

But until then, until then, we occupy.

We occupy with how with prayer and intercession, fasting.

You know, going around the world, it gets hot when you stand in front of the gates of hell in redirect traffic.

We ain't here to sip a pina colada and be comfortable.

We're here to get busy.

Amen.

Fast.

Fast.

You know the Bible says when you pray for something, there are some things that prayer cannot do.

Did you know that?

Did you hear that?

Fast and pray.

Oh yeah, fast it from my iPad.

Can I just end that note right there?

Okay.

Learn.

Pray.

And the God that I know, the series that Robert Morris had been doing for many, many years.

I just went through it again myself.

Actually, sorry, it was the first time, but I'm now actually going through it again.

Because I love it.

Please, if you've never gone through the sixth series of the God I Know, it's been incredible.

Learn how to pray.

Learn what Pastor Robert Morris as well talks about praying in the spirit as well.

Pray, pray, pray.

Ready?

Commissioned champions, pray.

Amen.

We run as if we're gonna win.

So you ain't gonna win without prayer and fasting.

Amen.

Number two, commissioned champions heal.

It's very interesting.

Let me read you first the scripture.

Isaiah 62, 1 says, The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor.

He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who abound.

I want you to know that if Christians have ever hurt you, I am sorry.

And Jesus would never hurt you.

He doesn't have the capacity to hurt you, he can only heal you, love you.

He'll never remind you of the shame or the guilt or the condemning thoughts in your brain.

That's not what God is saying.

How do you know when God's speaking to you?

If you know the word of God, you know when something pops in your head, is that Him or is that not Him?

And when you know the truth, the truth.

I wish there were more churches that would help actually have like that's what we're doing through Life of That Limbs, helping small groups have like these small groups that talk about abuse and sit down and unpack and heal.

We all go through depression.

I went through depression.

I got 65 people here, my guests, 65 people, and I'll tell you 12 of them know me really well, and they all know that I went through a depression and I went through counseling in February 2021.

And it was amazing.

72-year-old Russell, my counselor, and he's heard everything at 72, right?

So we're zooming, and he says, What do you want to talk about?

And I said, In 2002, this is what happened, and then 06 and 07 and 08, and he started crying.

I'm like, Oh, it feels good when someone cries.

I knew it was bad, and he said, I'm so sorry that you went through that.

I said, Yeah, it's actually surprising that the last three years have brought up old wounds, and if those wounds don't become battle scars, you go back there without you even knowing it.

You want to be an instrument in God's hand.

Do you know what God wants more for you than to use you for something?

He wants you healed.

Healed, healed of your addiction, healed of your affliction, healed of what your dad screamed at you at nine years old, healed of fatherlessness, healed of what's going on.

Oh, what had happened.

He wants you healed, and I love it.

Our history is his story, and I'm so sorry if you've been sexually abused.

I think that is way worse than I could ever imagine, and I think it's way worse than having no arms and no legs.

But I want to tell you something.

If you went through what you've been through and you find a counselor here, tell someone this is what I've actually been going through.

I went to church for five years, I haven't told anybody.

Would you say, would you give me someone I could talk to, please?

Why?

Because you know the wound needs to move forward into your battle scar.

You will always have affliction.

I think that's the problem with Gen Z.

They're praying for no affliction, delusional, biblically illiterate.

It doesn't make sense.

It's almost like working for money is not from God.

What we want it easy, we want a coast, and especially when we go through something difficult, we don't really want to really address it.

No, we need healing in Jesus' name.

Let me tell you what would it look like for you to look back in all of your pain, in all of your affliction, in all of your brokenness, for you to look back and say, Oh, thank you, God, what would it be?

But when I was 24 years old speaking in front of a church, I saw a little boy with no arms and no legs, just like me.

Little foot like this, and I'm like, dude, I want to wrestle him later on.

And I got their father up again, little Daniel Martinez, little foot like me, looking up at me, and I'm looking down at him, and I can't give him a high five.

So I put my little foot on his foot.

And his mother came up weeping, and she said, Thank you.

Now I know you're our miracle.

Thank you for helping me believe that God still has a plan for my son.

Now I know he's gonna be okay.

Let me ask you, what do you think I said?

Oh, you're welcome.

As if I had anything to do with that, nothing.

I turned away from sin, I came to God, my soul was restored, I learned how to pray, I learned how to fast, and even till recently I was still dealing with wounds that held me back.

Get healed, get prayer, and understand that in the brokenness that we have, God delights in using the foolish things of this world to confound the wise.

It's in it's divinely providential that God ever can use a man without arms and legs to be his hands and feet.

If God can use a limbless man to be his hands and feet, then God can use any willing heart.

Come on.

But he wants you healed.

When you get out of addiction or affliction or oppression and you get out of that prison, all you want to do is go around the world and say, Jesus loves you, man.

The king of the universe died for you and he loves you.

And whether you believe him or not, he still died for you and he loves you, and you can spit in his face and swear all you want.

He still loves you.

And when you meet Jesus and you turn away from this, God, heal me, renew my mind, change me, give me you.

That I don't want to sin anymore.

I don't want that sin.

I want it, I want what you want because money, drugs, sex, alcohol, pornography, fame, and fortune, if you put your happiness in temporary things, your happiness will be temporary.

And what you're looking for, if you don't know Jesus Christ, I'm telling you right now, you need to know him.

He wants you healed.

I can't heal you, but he can.

And our history is his story.

So for as long as you're breathing, he's got the pen in his hand.

And it ain't done yet.

Your history is his story.

Now I know in heaven, little Daniel Martinez is gonna be up there with arms and legs.

I'm gonna have my own arms and legs, and then he's gonna hug me and he's gonna cry, and he's gonna say, Thank you, Uncle Nick, for helping me believe that this place called heaven was real.

Hallelujah, thank you, Jesus.

Now, here it is, ready?

What if God wants you healed to then heal another person who's actually being disabled on the inside and you get healed and you get set free, and you go to heaven, and someone comes up to you and says, Hey, I met you through Gateway Church, and you don't know this, but there was one day that you looked at me and you said, This, and you prayed for me, and I never got to see you again on earth.

That was the seed that brought me and my family here.

Remember, remember, this is a short life.

I love God.

I love him.

And he won't let any bit of pain be wasted.

You can't turn back time.

You can't turn back time, but God holds time, and whatever happened, it's okay.

Because God is with me.

And it might take ten years to heal.

Pastor Robert, I'm a preacher since age 19, an ordained minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and it took me ten years to forgive somebody.

I'm just like you.

But God changes everything.

Joelle, can you play some piano back here?

I play piano, but I'm not warmed up yet.

All right, going back to structure, here we go.

Point number three.

Are you getting anything?

Are you encouraged?

Are we good?

Are we good?

Come on.

It's heavy.

It's heavy, but it's good.

Amen.

Scripture, it's true.

Commissioned champions, ready, ready, ready.

Drum roll, preach.

You know, out of all the generations of all the nations that have ever lived historically, I think actually in America, this generation is gonna be the most harshly judged.

Because we were given the most and we sacrificed the least.

Have you ever written down how you were?

In your life before you found Jesus Christ?

Have you ever written down this thing called a testimony?

Of how he healed your heart?

Of how he renewed you?

Of how he broke chains of this and brought you that?

And now you were in love with him?

Have you written down your love story for him?

Has anyone taught you how to preach the gospel in three minutes and understand what to say when an Islamist person comes up to you and says, Oh, we worship the same God?

Do you know what to say to that?

Do you know what to say when people say, I don't believe in a loving God, because if he's love, then why is there pain in the world?

Do you know how to answer that?

I love that one of the series passed Robert when you asked every single person on that series, put your hand up if you've actually experienced a miracle.

And 99.9% of everyone said, I experienced a miracle.

I'm thinking, man, I just wish we shared that with everyone.

We're so quick to pray for something and we get it and we forget.

Kind of sounds like the Israelites.

Write down the blessings of God.

Write down your testimony.

Pray, pray, pray.

Why do you need to wait for Easter and Christmas to preach the gospel?

Are you serious?

You don't need theology and seminar, uh, what do you call seminary to preach the gospel?

We are part of the Great Commission, according to Matthew 28.

We are to go into all the nations and preach the gospel.

Matthew 28, 16.

The eleven disciples went away into Galilee to the mountain which Jesus appointed for them.

When they saw him, they worshiped him, but some doubted, and Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, Well, authority has been given to me on heaven and on earth.

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.

This is the perfect time to preach the gospel.

Let's go, let's go.

There's only eight billion.

I own the domain, eight billionsouls.com.

You get a hundred thousand people, you train them to evangelize, they go out on a Saturday, they don't come home till they preach the gospel to ten people, and that's a million people here in the gospel of Jesus Christ in a day.

Then year two, you double it, then year three, you double it.

You understand?

A hundred thousand troops, year one, two hundred thousand troops, year two, four hundred thousand troops, year three.

Are you with me?

Do you know what happens by 2033 with that simple mathematical equation?

Eight billion people, and I don't know about you, I don't know about you, but I want to go home, and I want the broken to know Jesus loves them.

I want the afflicted and addicted to know that there is hope, and there is no other hope but the name of Jesus Christ.

There is no other name that you can be saved outside of the name of Jesus Christ, whether you like it or not.

So you get saved, you get healed, and then what do you do?

You go preach.

You wanna know what like I why I like the word preach?

Because most of it's preach.

Hallelujah.

If there is anyone here who doesn't know Jesus Christ, I'm gonna tell you right now, this world ain't gonna give you the peace that Jesus can give you.

They're not gonna they're not gonna give you what you really need.

And right now, if you right now, all across this place, if you know that you are not in good standing with Jesus Christ and you want to say, Yes, God, come into my life.

I know this is what I'm missing.

Nick, I want to give my life to Jesus Christ right now, all across this campus and all the campuses, right across the DFW Metroplex, stand right now.

I'm gonna pray with you.

Stand if you know that you do not have a relationship with Jesus Christ, stand right now.

Come on, come on, stand, stand, stand at your feet, stand at your feet, stand at your feet.

Anybody?

I see you.

I can't see that well from here.

If you're standing, listen, let's pray.

Say, dear Lord Jesus, come into my life.

I want to know you, heal my heart, teach me how to pray, help me to look for you and live for you.

I'm a sinner, forgive me, change me, renew me, forgive me, heal me, and fill me with your Holy Spirit.

I don't want to sin, I want to now live for you.

So help me, God, in Jesus' name.

I pray.

Amen.

Amen.

Campuses love you, God bless you.

Thanks for joining us today.

If you'd like to connect with us, text Connect to 71010 or visit gatewaypeople.com.

We hope you have a great week.