It is Necessary That You Be Ready

One through thirteen. So if you can stand with me as.

I read through these scriptures, Amen, Matthew. Twenty five, verses

one through thirteen. If you need me to hold on,

say hold on. If you got it, say amen?

Amen.

Amen, not Russian, anyone not quite sure? Okay, Amen, We're

not rushing today.

Hallelujah. Patience is a virtue. Amen. Amen. For some of us.

That's hard to do sometimes. But we have to learn

how to be patient.

Amen. We'll learn that from this text. Yeah, we don't

want to always be speedy, speedy, rushy, rushi. We're ready.

Twenty five, verses one through thirteen. Amen.

And the word of the Lord says, then shall the

kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins which took

their lamps and went forth to meet the bridegroom. And

five of them were wise, and five were foolish. They

that were foolish took their lamps and took no oil

with them. But the wives took all in their vessels

with their lamps.

While the groom tarried.

They all slumbered and slept, And at midnight there was

a cry maid, behold the bridegroom cometh, go ye out

to meet him. Then all those virgins arose and trim

their lamps, and the foolish said, unto the wives, give

us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out.

But the wise answered, saying, not so, lest there be

not enough for us and you. But go ye rather

to them that sell, and buy some yourselves. And while

they went to buy, the bridegroom came and they we're ready,

went in with him to the marriage, and the door

was shut. After word came also the other virgin, saying, Lord,

open to us.

But he answered and said, verily, I say unto you.

I know you not watch therefore, for ye know neither

the day nor the hour we're in the Son of

Man cometh. May God add a blessing to the reading, hearing,

and understanding of his word. A man, you may be

seated in the presence of the Lord. My title for

this message is it is necessary that.

You be ready.

I see fit for this to be a word for

such a time as this, because as we again mean,

I say this all the time. For years people have

been saying Christ as soon to come, Christ is soon

to come, Christ.

Is soon to come.

And I think they've been saying this for over two

thousand years now, Christs soon to come. Christ was soon

to come. Right after Christ left, that was his message

to the disciples.

He was leaving, but he'd come back for him.

He was going to prepare a place in heaven for

those that would choose to serve him, for those that

would follow him. And so you would think, after two

thousand years, many are already gone.

Whether they've gone on to.

Be with the Lord, or whether they're already in eternal damnation,

we don't know, but I do know it's been over

two thousand years. So understanding that there is a necessity

to be ready, you would think in the midst of waiting,

and you have to be ready while you're waiting. Some

would get real, real tired in that way. But Jesus

tells this parable of the ten virgins. All ten were invited,

all ten had lamps, all ten were waiting on the bridegroom,

but only five were ready when it mattered. So we

get this parable from Jesus as an illustration of what

we should be doing. And so, as I said earlier,

it's been over two thousand years since Jesus has been gone.

Are we still waiting?

Many of us just got here I just heard Minister

Tamika say that she just got saved, and while she

was unsaved, the Lord was keeping her while she was

driving drunk, while she was doing drugs. So many of

us are not even to the place where we understand

that there's a wait. Many are just moving around as

if nothing has taken place. But the difference wasn't opportunity.

The difference wasn't access. The difference was the readiness.

You had to be ready.

It's not optional and it's not suggested. It's necessary that

we be ready.

Some years and it hadn't even been that long.

I was finna say some years ago, like it had

been about ten fifteen yearsrobably, about.

Two three years ago, we started a Bible study group

at the house.

Some of the prayer warriors had decided that they could

get a good Bible study from the leader over.

The prayer team, which was me.

So they asked me to put together a Bible study

for them. And so I think it was probably right

after our first second meeting, the Lord gave me a

word for the Bible study group, and he said, get ready,

stay ready, so.

That you'll be ready.

That was the importance of that Bible study group. So

not that we could come together as women and sit

in gossip and sit in lilligag and sit and play,

but so that we could come together get the Word

of God in us and get an understanding of what

the Word of God was telling us for such a

time as this. And that's exactly what we did. So

readiness is not optional, it's a requirement.

It requires the readiness requires us.

We have to have it in order for us to

access what God.

Is prepared for us. We won't make it in if

we're not ready. That's not scriptural. We will not make

it in if we're not ready.

So while we have the time, let us find ourselves

getting ready. In this parable, again, there's ten virgins. All

of them had the same invitation. We all have the

same invitation. Even the sinner has the same invitation. That

invitation was for me before I even got the salvation.

So the invitation is to come. The bridegroom is throwing

this big bank with this big wedding, and he's inviting

all of us to come.

But you have to prepare yourself to go in.

You can't just go in the way you want to

go in, like many of us want to do what

we want to do. Prepare for everything else but the

coming of Christ. Many of us have prepared for retirement.

That ain't me yet, but we should be getting started.

Retirement means I'm gonna have money when I don't work

no more. Retirement means I'm gonna be set for when

I don't have to get up and go.

To work anymore.

Many of us were prepared for doctor's appointments. We know

that it's time to go to our annual physical. We

start taking care of our bodies. Some of us might

even lose a few pounds. I'm going to the doctor.

I don't want him to say nothing about my weight.

I prepare to go for the grocery store. How many

of us don't write a list out. Sometimes even prepare

in my mind how much I'm gonna spend, even though

it don't work that way once I get there. We

understand as human beings the preparation is necessary. But for

Jesus to tell this parable, obviously he understood that the

people wouldn't understand the preparation was necessary for his coming.

So he enlightens us by using the parable of the

ten virgins, says that this is not only our way

to have access to what God has.

Went and done, what Jesus has went and done.

But in this parable we also recognize that only five

had access to what he did. This shows us or

makes a comparison of the.

Wise to the foolish.

And I remember before I got say, they would always say,

you can't call nobody no food.

That's a sin. You can't call nobody no food.

But the Bible continuously gives us insight on recognizing the

foolish from the wise. Jesus, neither of God, neither the

Holy Spirit ever meant for us to be ignorant to

the fact that there's two different sects of people, not

that he has called us to separate ourselves due to

them sex because a lot of people take that and

they say, well, when the Bible says that come from

among them and be separated, he wants us to come

from among what they're doing. But we have to go

back to him in order to help them.

Somebody witness to me.

So Lord, for being all the saved people sit on

one side of the room, and all the unsaved people

sit on the other side of the room. They ain't

gonna never get no help. So that's not the separation.

But the separation is to know, because if I don't

know that I'm being foolish or making a foolish decision,

I'm in the dark. Yes, if the wise person don't

understand that what they doing is wise and what the

foolish person doing is foolish, then the wise person might

be MISTERO strewed and go over with the foolish person

thinking what they doing is right. So it's never meant

for us to be in ignorance that there's wisdom and

there's foolishness. There's wise people and there's some fools. So

Jesus takes this parable and depicts it exactly the way

it is. There were some wise virgins, but there was

also some foolish versions, and the difference with them came

to their opportunity because the wise were wise enough they

knew to get ready.

The foolish were foolish, so they were not ready.

So it's important that we make sure that we understand

that there is a depiction between the wise and the foolish.

God does not require perfection, So let's move that one

out the way too, because you'll find somebody that's not

living right and they see somebody else that's living right.

Oh, she thinks she all that.

Or you can find somebody that's doing the best that

they can do. So they think they doing everything that

is right. Now'll say, oh they ain't there yet, I'm

better than them. No, has nothing to do with perfection.

It has all to do with readiness. Not.

Can I read longer than you? Not? Can I pray

longer than you? Not? Can I go on a three

day fast and you can only do two?

I mean I am fasted for two hours and somebody

else fasted for thirty. But that don't make them more

readier than me. What counts is that my readiness is

in my heart. My readiness is with God. It is

necessary to be personally prepared personally, and I'm trying to

say that pe as hard as I can, because this

is a personal relationship. My relationship with God don't have

anything to do with you except for God.

It's called us to be a community.

But when it comes to my relationship with God, that's

a personal things.

It's personal.

How I pray, it's personal, how fast, it's personal, how

I spend.

Time with God. God.

Because when I stand before God on Judgment Day, I

don't get to stand with none of y'all.

Y'all or nobody else.

So for everything that I am that comes at me

that I'm judged for, I can't say, well, Lord, I

didn't do that because of so and so. Lord, I

didn't spend time with you, because I had to do

this because Jesus already told us in order to live

for him, we got to die of self in order

to gain we're gonna lose. I done lost plenty of sleep,

I've lost plenty of private time. Why it's for my relationship,

my personal relationship with God. And so when it comes

to that personal relationship, that's why it says that all

of them had lamps. We're not saying the foolish virgins

did not have lamps. The Word of God says they

all had them. So with them all having lamps, the

lamps symbolized that the Blue Leavers outward profession of faith

was there. But the thing about an outward profession is

what's going on on the inside, what's going on on

the inside.

I've given this testimony once before.

When I got saved, everybody in their mama work because

I didn't get saved the church. I was at work

when I got saved, and so everybody at work knew Johnny.

They knew Johnny was an alcoholic, they knew she was

a cusser, they knew she was a complainer.

I used to complain so much. I'd have people telling me, ooh,

could you please go sit over there?

And if it's that bad, why don't you just quit?

That was Johnny before Johnny got saved, so they knew

all the ugliness about me. But when I got saved,

everybody else starts, Man, I'm saved, I'm saved. I'm saved too.

Well again, I don't understand salvation. I wasn't raised up

in church. I think salvation is just that everybody go

to church. But what the Lord started doing was something

completely different. He didn't send me to a church house.

He started changing.

Me inwardly the way I thought, the way I talked.

Was delivering me from alcohol, and I won't say was

delivering me. My deliverance was instantaneously. The Lord said that's

your last drink. That was my last drink smoked for

twenty years. He said, that's your last cigarette. That was

my last cigarette. So everything that he started doing, he

did it instantaneously. So while I was changing. They was

all still looking the same and trying to tell me

how to live. Thats the same person. Now, I wasn't

judging them, But if y'all just don't, he ain't why

he ain't doing to y'all what he's doing to me.

I think I learned in the beginning to start questioning God.

So then I went to guard and questioned him because

I had a sister. Tell me now that I will say.

They was all my brothers and sisters were all siblings.

You know, you have to call everybody brother and sister. Again,

this is new to me. This is new to me.

Salvation is new. So you got to give it to

me there, and you have to give it to them.

They tried, but the difference kept showing up. There's a

difference between the foolish virgin and the wise virgin. Those

differences are gonna be seen because it's not just an

outward look.

The lamp.

See, I can tote the lamp, and why I'm walking

around with the lamp. You can see my lamp. Have

any of y'all ever seen the lamps that they put

the all in. Unless you get close up on that lamp,

you can't see that all. You can see the flickering

from the little limp that's on the top, but you still.

Can't see that all all is an inward.

This lamp is a representation of the out work, the

profession of faith. How many of you know that your

testing trials come to test your faith. It don't never

show how big or how.

Real your faith feels.

Into something on the outside happens, then everything on the

inside to start showing up on the outside. Because if

I got faith that Jehovah Jyra is my provider, then

when I can't pay my bills, I don't get weary.

I don't go to running around.

Like a chicken with my head cut off, saying, Lord,

what am I gonna do? Hoim I gonna do this?

I don't know what to do now? So my inwd

will always be depicted on the outside when I'm saying

I'm a true believer. Back to my coworkers, when they

said they were saying because I was say, they wasn't changing.

They were still smoking, they were still drinking, they were

still cussing. I didn't even understand tides, but some of

them did, and I had a whole bunch of them

to say when you go to church with.

You take my tides.

So it's not that they didn't have something. They had

a little something inwardly, but they didn't have enough inwardly.

Their lamps were not full. This whole parable is about

what's in your lamp. It's you're all.

It's necessary for us to not just profess on the outside,

but profess on the inside. Only five had a reserve

for all. So what's a reserve for all? Pastor Jay

means you have capacity, You have the room.

In you to do what the spirit is calling you

to do.

Right. I went through this and I was telling Minister

right over there because I was just all excited about

this this message. Last week, I pulled up at his

house and I said, oh my goodness, and this is

because I'm driving and the Lord is talking to me.

And how many of y'all know he do that?

And you don't have no pen And then you'll be like,

come on, Jesus, you know I'm not gonna remember this.

So I'm talking to Minister write about this all, and

I'm like, okay, because he wants them to go the

other vergins.

Tell him to go borrow all. You can't borrow.

All and the representation when you when you do research

on the all, the all is still considered the holy spirit.

But they still told him to go borrow the Holy spirit.

My holy Spirit ain't.

Working right today.

I hadn't spent enough time with the Lord, and can

I get some Holy Spirit? And so I was telling

Minister write, I say that that one got me.

That one got me. I had to do some more,

some more researching and some more studying on it.

But the all is more of a representation of your

inner spiritual preparedness. What am I doing to make sure

that my all is still flowing? When was the last

time we read a scripture? And I won't even say

when was the last time you read one? When was

the last time you studied one? When was the last

time that you decided I'm gonna get deep with the

Lord on today?

I mean, because there's no word now.

I done heard some people say this, but so many

people have said so much. That's why I tell people

don't listen to people go with the word, cause so

many people have said, well, you can't just ask God anything.

I beg to different because if you don't ask, how

you gonna know? He said, seek and you shall find

ask and it shall be given. So even with wisdom

and knowledge, if it's something I don't know, I need

to go to the Lord. I don't need to be

going to man. The Bible says, any man to lack wisdom,

let him ask, and I will give it unto him.

And look umbradily. No attaches nothing with that thing. Just

ass I got you holy spirit. So that's the feeling,

that's the preparedness that we partake in more of what

God has called us to do. The five virgins that

were foolish, they were so foolish that they felt like,

I don't have to read every day. Hey, God, the

word of God says that he is my daily bread.

So I can eat every day a meal, but not

eat the daily bread. That's like having a sandwich without

the bread. I got all this meat and I ain't

got no bread.

It don't even taste right.

We use the bread to put the mail and the

mustard on to give it a little added flavor. I

ain't even got no added flavor because I won't read

the word.

I'm dull. I ain't got no flavor to me. Did

the Word not say.

That I was the soul of the earth, but I

ain't got no flavor because I ain't got no daily bread.

That's the preparedness we have to prepare our Holy Spirit,

our personal relationship. A personal relationship is not on Sundays.

A personal relationship is not on Wednesdays. Me and my

husband don't spend a lot of time as much time

as we should spend together, and that's one of our

go to back and forth. Well, how do you think

the Lord feels if I have this intimate relationship with him?

Because I understand how my husband feel and I hope

he understand when I said, But like I say, we

sometimes go back and forth about that one.

So would you not think that.

Some of the times that nudget at your spirit is

not the Lord going back and forth with you because

the Bible says he does bring forth conviction. Now, don't

get me wrong. If you can't, if it's gonna take well,

I'm not even gonna say that, Thank you, Holy Spirit.

What's five to ten minutes to day with him and

I'm giving everything else hours My daycare is open from

seven thirty to five thirty.

That's ten hours out of the day.

The majority of us work eight hours out of a day.

Then you go home, then you cook, or then you

go watch TV, or then you go to the store,

or then you go to your friend's house, or then

you get on the headphone over here for some people.

And I don't even say women anymore, because me and

gospel just as much as women do now. But you'll

get on the phone and you'll talk about everybody all

day long.

And that's and that's that's still time spent. Because this reserve.

Is said to be a kept vessel. This vessel represents

the believers in This vessel is where we keep our awe.

This this vessel is considered to be a call to

fulfill God's work. The vessel represents holiness and dedication to God.

Acts nineteen fifteen refers to power as a chosen vessel.

Power was chosen to spread the gospel and to stay ready.

If power was chosen to spread the gospel, were not

chosen to spread the gospel? Are we not chosen vessels?

I think sometimes people get so much so caught up

in titles that if they don't have a title, they

don't think they're supposed to do anything. But that's not biblical.

Even when it said Jesus called them. These gifts that

he gave when he came back, those gifts are for

the five fold ministry. That's for the work in the church.

We don't work in the church all the time. Even

those of.

Us that have a title should be working outside the church.

We're not here. I just said it while ago.

It's a Sunday and a Wednesday thing, and some don't

even come on Wednesdays.

It's just a Sunday thing.

So if your relationship is only built out for that

one day, then you have to be doing something outside

of here.

Yeah.

I'm not saying nothing about you if you don't come

to church, but I'm saying, if you're not here on Wednesday,

what's your Bible study life like? If you miss a

couple of Sundays, what's your prayers life like? This the

house of prayer part of keeping that all flowing. It's

not just Bible study, it is prayer too. That's our

intimacy with the Lord. This is when I can really

sit down and ask some questions. Not only can I

ask questions, but even doing prayer, I can tell the

Lord all that's going on in my life. The Bible says,

let every supplication and request be made known unto God.

So if it's something that I'm dealing with, something that

I don't have, I need to be going to the Lord.

And many of us will choose to go to other

people before we go to God.

That's time again that we could be spending with the Lord.

I ain't praying three days now. I'm broke, So I'm

going to go to the bank.

Instead of me praying for three days and on the

fourth day expecting God to answer them prayers. Because why

I've been in prayer, I've been saying, Lord.

I'm in lack. Now. Your word said that you knew

where I was gonna be before I got here. And

I also say you.

Attentive unto the cries of your people. I'm crying out

right now. Lord, I need a financial breakthrough. I need

a financial blessing. I'm trusting in you to make a

way out of no way. Here's a bridge over trouble waters,

ain't he? And if I don't have no money, that

sounded like trouble Water's right?

Amen?

So, But instead many of us will go to the phone,

call old girl, you got ten fifteen, I can borrow

the long company. You got ten fifteen. I can borrow,

And I'm just being honest. So when we do that,

we're depleting ourselves of the all instead of putting the

all in, because we're going outside for what we need

instead of inside. The Bible says that the five wise

there were five wives and five foolish, but the wires

took all in their vessels, and.

The foolish had none. So even though they knew that the.

Bridegroom was coming back, they was not getting prepared. How

many of us know Jesus is coming back. Are we

getting prepared? Are we kind of like sitting and waiting

on that thing? Because I believe the other concept that

we can get from this parable is that why they

were waiting, they had to be doing something. And there's

a lot of people that are just waiting. They saying,

because I'm saved, I'm going to heaven. I'm gonna make

it in.

I got this. He has prepared the wait for me.

But when this parable story, I'm going ahead of myself.

I get there in a minute. I'll get there in

a minute, Thank you, Holy Spirit.

They all looked the same on the outside, and they

all had the same lamp. They all had the same

assignment and they all had the same expectation, but inwardly

they were different. They were different just like today's people.

Today's people, they look saved, they sound saved, They even

post scriptures on social media, and they even attend church sometimes,

but they still have a lack of preparation.

Preparation.

Ain't saying that I'm saved, because the Bible says you

can say one thing with your mouth, but your heart

be far from it. Save means I'm saved from my sins.

I accepted what Jesus did on the cross for me.

Saved says I'm changing the way I live, not because

of me, but because of who is in me now.

He didn't save me to leave me the same. That's

why he gives us a whole new heart.

Not even that.

He'll come in and make your heart over. He gives

you a new one. Save people, It's okay to start

thinking different, It's okay to start acting different.

It's okay to.

Feel different because with that change, that's what comes. So

playing the part of being saved is not what's gonna

prepare you for the coming of Christ. God is not

looking at our image, He's looking at our all. So

many people think because they got an image that sit

them in that thing. And that's not just for the

people that are unsaved, but that's for the ones that

are preaching, teaching and prophesying. But they ain't who God

and called them to be. So we're looking at this

as the coming of Christ. We know that in chapter

in one Timothy, chapter three, it says that.

We're living in perilous times.

So when you look at the rise of the false teachers,

the false preachers, the false prophets.

They come right after church. They ain't even the people.

That's on the outside professing I might not be saved.

Jesus is talking about them, the saying they say the

outward looks like it, their inward is completely different. But

the thing about it is everybody that has something on

the inside, it will eventually show up on the outside.

You can't hold it. You can't hold it in.

If you a cusser, eventually it's gonna come out. If

you a liar, eventually you're gonna lie. If you're a thief,

eventually you're gonna steal something. Yeah, if you're somebody with

im moral integrity, eventually it's gonna show up.

You can hide it in church, all you want to,

but eventually it's gonna show up. So when it shows up,

that's who you are now again.

We're working on getting better. But you can't let that

be your excuse forever, because how long does it take God?

And I'm just saying you hear people say all the time,

God's still working on me.

God still working on me, and surely he is. But

if he's still working on you with the.

Same thing for the last ten years, what you're trying

to tell me about my father, I'm just saying because

you didn't say I hadn't changed yet, their excuse is

always God is still working on me. I mean, can

God not get the job done again? I'm not saying

that everybody's deliverance and their new income to salvation it's

gonna be like mine. But if He could instantaneously deliver

me from alcohol and smoking, you mean to tell me

of taking him twenty years to deliver you. Not the

instantaneously God, the omnipotent God that I'm not present, God,

the God that already knew you had that.

Addiction before he saved you.

God, not that God. You mean to tell me that

God is having a hard time getting you the change,

not that God. That's the only thing that I be

thinking of when people say, well, God and I finished

with me? Yet I understand that it's a work not finished.

But there's some things that the Lord can be trying

to pull us out of or get us to change from.

And it ain't got nothing to do with God. It's

me and my stubbornness. It's me in my wanting to

state the way that I am. Don't leave me alone. Lord,

I'm okay right here. You mean I got to stop

lying because the Bible says he brings forth convictions.

So when I lied yesterday, something said, girl, you know

you wasn't supposed to be lying, And you said no, God,

but that was a little white lie. Ain't no such

thing as a little white lie.

So it ain't that it's hard for God to create

the change in us that needs to be created, but

in my vessel that can be work with readiness begins

with what you carry.

Do you carry a heart of repentance?

Do you know how many people don't want to repent

because to repent is to say that I'm wrong. Repent

means I have to turn from that thing which I

really know ain't right, And not go back to it again.

That was the word that Jesus came with.

That was the word that John Baptists came with, Repent

for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. And then

Jesus came right back on the scene and back that

up repent because I'm here now. And for a lot

of individuals, saints, people that say, they say, people that

like to put the crosses on the back of their car,

put the bumper stickers on the back of their car.

I'm saved. Don't get too close or get close. I'm saved.

I love you. And then that's the.

Person that you run up on and then when you

get on the side of them and they cussing you

out because you were too close to they bumper. Now,

just read your bumper sticker and it said you was

saved and you love me?

And you what to what mean?

Because they're doing all of this stuff and you don't

know what they doing sign language, and so.

It's it's that it's the application to this is.

Your walk with God must be personal. I can't make

you save, you can't make me save. You can't make

me live right. I can't make you live right.

I can encourage you. Hey, you on a fast with

me on today?

We do that every now and then with the with

the prayer group. Hey, let's let's fast for a day.

Let's fast from six to six.

I can encourriage you.

But even with that fasting or praying, that still has

some intimacy with it. I'm not gonna be at your

house while we faster, so I don't know if you

really fast, and if you are really fast, and I

don't know that you're praying fast.

Thing is not to be done just to do.

I'm not gonna just stop eating and Lord, that's gonna

help me.

No faster.

That means I'm gonna push away the plate, but I'm

gonna pull up the word.

I'm gonna pull up the word.

That's why Jesus say some of these things only come

out through faster than praying. Because while you're fast and

you're seeking God, Lord, what should.

I be doing? What did this fast? I don't want

this fast be in vain? God?

What would you have me to do? Is it anything

I need to hear from you? Do I need to

turn this music off?

Matter of fact? Do I need to turn that person

off so they're not interrupting me?

While I'm taking this time to commune with you, while

I'm consecrating myself for the Lord. Yeah, it might be

some stuff I don't need to listen to. Some people

I don't need to talk to, but that is what

God is looking for.

I cannot live off of my appearances. I cannot.

I can wear dresses, long sleeve, turtlenecked shirts as a

woman and that don't make me save. I can wear

a suit and to tie every day as a man,

and that don't make me save. And just because I

keep saying I'm saved, don't make me saved.

Salvation has nothing to do with what I say.

Salvation has to do with what I've received and what

I believe.

And if I believe that I.

Have been saved out of my sins, out of darkness,

and God has invited me into his marvelous life, that's

just showing the lifestyle that I live. The Bible say

confess with your mouth, believe in your heart. But if

you make that confession and you don't believe in the

confession you made, that's like me saying I'm gonna lose

weight today.

But I don't believe that.

I'm just saying that because I want you to think

that that's what I'm really working on. I'm working on

getting myself together in my body. And then every time

every time I turn around, there.

You go, I'm eating.

I just said something, but deep down on the inside,

I really didn't believe what I say. That's why the

Word of God says that it is impossible to please

God without faith. Because if I'm saying this is something

I'm doing on, I'm saying this is.

Who I am. I got to walk that thing out.

How many of us know that God holds us accountable

to what we say. You can't keep setting and saying

I'm saying, sanctify, I fear with the Holy Spirit, and.

You just sitting her and you still the same.

There has to be some evidence but God's grace and mercy,

and because he's so long suffering with us, and again

because for over two thousand years he's been long suffering.

But the day is coming when Jesus will come back.

That's why we have this parable. Before you get the

chapter twenty five, Chapter twenty four, he gives the signs

of the end time.

The people say what it's going to.

Be like, so he starts telling them and in those

signs of the end times. You even get some mornings,

and then right after that then he tells you what

to do to get ready.

Don't be a fool, be wise about this day. Make

sure that you have your own.

It is necessary to be ready for the delay. Again,

it's been over two thousand years. I got to be

ready for that delay because again, as I said earlier,

many of us are impatient.

We live in a time where if it don't go

in the microwave, a lot of people won't buy it.

And not just what we eat.

When we pray, we think God's supposed to answer it

right away.

Even though he said do it, Terry, wait on it. See,

that's what Jesus says. Here.

It says, and while the bridegroom tarry verse five, While

the bridegroom.

Tarry it, but listen at this they all.

Look at your neighbor, and say, they all, every last

one of them, all ten of them.

Went to sleep. They slept this slumber. Yeah.

So, but what that shows us is that the way

can be tiresome, the way can get tarsome. Even some

of the best of us can get tired.

Jesus took Jesus took.

Peter, John and James up with him. And what did

he say? He say, wait here while I go pray.

I'll be back. He went and prayed, he came back.

They would sleep. He woke them up.

Y'all, come on, wake up, y'all can't sleep with me

for just I mean, you can't stay awake with me

just one hour? Again, we've been waiting over two thousand years.

He asked them, about one hour. We in this church,

in this house, in this hour, over two thousand years.

So he woke him up, He went right back, came back.

They would sleep again. How many of us are falling asleep?

How many of us are falling asleep? But again, And

Jesus wanted us to know that it would be at him.

You know, he wouldn't have put that in there, that

all of them fell asleep. But if you can get

back up, and when you get back up, you still

got your all, you're still seeking your all, you're still

spending that time with the Lord. Because you're gonna get

a little tired. Yeah, that's why the Bible says be weary,

not in well doing, because you can be doing all

that you're doing and still get tired. Lord I've been

doing this and I've been doing that, and ain't nothing changing.

God is still the same, Lord. But I'm still praying. Lord,

but I'm still fasting God. I keep going, I'm pushing,

I'm pressing God, but it still ain't changed.

It's been twenty years now.

What the preacher preaching the anniversary and the revival, because

that's what I've been calling it on last Saturday.

We can't stop in the middle. You have to keep

the momentum.

And sometimes because it ain't happen when you wanted it

to happen, you just stop. He didn't answer your prayer

when you thought he should have answered your pressure, you

just stopped.

Lord, I ain't even gonna prayer about this one no more.

Even though you have an example in the Bible, the

woman that kept going to the king's door, knocking at

the man's door, kept going so till the man said,

on y'all give her what she won't give her what

she needs, because if I don't, this woman gonna drive

me crazy.

Some of us won't even be persistent in prayer. Some

of us won't be persistent in coming to church.

Some of us won't be persistent in what God has

asked us to do. Some of us won't be persistent

and fasting. Some of us won't be persistent in helping people. Yeah,

this is our preparation to.

Get in, but we don't want to be persistent with God.

But you'll be persistent with that job.

You've been working there for five years.

Mad.

You'll be persistent with what I do every day on

every Tuesday routine. You're gonna be persistent for getting your

nails done, going to get your head slad. Yeah, you're

persistent with that, because Lord forbid, I miss a nail day.

Huh? Not have on my hands looking like that?

But you ain't heard from the Lord, So no, I

ain't gonna pray no more. I don't understand the words,

so I'm gonna stop reading it. I ain't getting nothing

from it anyway, God, I don't even know what you're saying.

Persistent with preparing yourself for everything else except for the

coming of Christ.

That's the type of world we live in.

Delays are not just made for delays. Delays are made

for development.

What can you do while you waiting?

Huh? Can I even practice on what it is the

Lord has called me to do? Can I practice praying.

Can I practice preaching? Can I practice loving on somebody?

Can I practice being kind? Can I practice being considerate?

I'm just saying the delay is an opportunity for us

to develop. Jesus has given us time to get ready.

He hadn't came now because there's.

Some people that still need to get ready.

Thank you Jesus, one of them, one of them. I

am a work in progress. So he has not come yet.

It's not his.

Delay, but it's the opportunity for us to develop. A

delay is not a denial, like some of us stopped praying. Oh,

he ain't gonna give it to me anyway, because while

you was praying, the enemy creepd in and was whispering

in your ear while you were praying to the Lord,

and you didn't recognize it was the enemy. But the

Word of God says that all God's promises a yeah

and amen. So if it's in his word, it is so,

it is so. But if you don't believe, if you

don't have faith in that word, you're gonna miss out

on that. The delay separates the wise from the foolish

by the testing of their endurance in preparation. Matthew twenty

four and thirteen says those that are enduring to the

end shall be saved. The wise will stay in communion

as well as communication. Even though they all slumbered and

slept because they grew tired, the wise still understood the

waiting period. The wise did not lose focus. They didn't

lose focus on the promise. The delay will cause us

to sometimes fall into a spiritual lethargy, complacency, or lack

of vigilance. And when you lose those, you separate yourself

from God, not as in.

The darkness, but you pull back.

And if any of you have ever pulled back, I

can be honest by myself. There was a time when

I said, Lord God, because I was getting up every morning,

like from six to seven, six to seven, whenever it

was time to take them kids' school, and I was

setting the word of God. I would vast in the

Word of God, and it was like nothing was happening.

And so that lethargy came up on me.

That feeling is if he wasn't hearing me, or he

didn't understand what I was going through. I'm not getting this,

and why can't I get this?

God?

So I stopped, not stop reading the word, but stop

getting up spending that quality time with God.

And so when I got ready to get back to it, man.

It was a press to get in, because anytime we're

going away too long, it's hard to get back. That's

one of the deceptions of the enemy. Oh God ain't

answered that prayer yet. Leave it alone. Oh God ain't

did that yet. Don't don't go back and ask him.

He'll even use people to tell you that you shouldn't

keep praying the same thing over.

And over again. That ain't what they say.

If you don't, if you really trust in God, you

won't keep asking for the same thing.

That's not a scripture. But the enemy will use people

to tell.

You that if you ain't got it when you think

you should have it, then it ain't God God as

just you wanting something.

But the Bible says that he'll give me the desires

of my heart.

And I'm a true of firm believer of Tyler that

the only reason he'll give me the desires of my

heart is because he placed those desires within my heart

a man, so he'd bee given me some things and

had those had me to lay those petitions before him.

So we don't want to go out of that.

We want to continue to make sure that we stay vigilant.

We want to study, we want to make sure we're

taking that quality time to pray with the Lord. We

have been called to live this life. That's called a journey.

It's not a one day trip. It's not you go

around the corner and you there. It's a journey. I've

never seen a journey that was short. Journeys are always

considered long longevity. It's gonna take you some time to

get there. It's gonna take us some time to get there.

But we got to keep going so that when he

gets here, we're ready. We have to be ready when

he come in order for the door not to be closed.

In us scriptural ones against sleeping and slumbering in dangerous times,

it's like a spiritual neglect or laziness. Proverbs six nine

and eleven causes sloughfulness that leads to that leads to poverty.

Some of us are in poverty because we sloughful. We

might not be the lazy one that's not working, because

that's what it says in Proverbs. But even with our

given even when our good stewardship, even with us being

mindful of how we manage what God. That's the good stewardship,

what God has given us all things belonged.

To the Lord.

I might have worked for it, but if he didn't

give me the strength to work, I wouldn't be able.

To work for it.

If heaven and earth is the Lord's and everything in

the earth is his, so is that? So we need

to be mindful even how to be better stuards over that.

But He's given us Romans thirteen and eleven, Paul says,

wake up from slumber, because our salvation is now near.

The first time we believe.

We can't slumber and sleep because now we're slumbering and

sleeping in dangerous times, dangerous hours.

That's too much going on. While you slumbering and sleeping.

The Muslims are raising up Mosca all over the place.

I just heard the news story the other day.

While the church is slumbering and sleeping that they're going

into the schoolhouse passing out pamphlets trying to convert kids

over to Muslims. And a lot of us won't even

go out and witness. It's time to go witness. You

can't go on, you busy. They're making an effort to

win people to the Islamic religion. While we're sleeping and slumbering,

while we're tired. While I was at work all day.

Oh I got somewhere to go. I can't do that.

They done literally set forth specific and right here in Texas,

right here in Dallas.

Those Fort Worth areas full of them.

That's why they was trying to get the shurial llowed

not to be passed. It was in for those that vote,

it was a part of our balance, the last voting

section to not pass.

The charial law. If we would get.

Out, open our eyes, wake up and study and look

and see what's going on, we would have a better

understanding because those are things we should not just be

voting against, we should be praying against. Because if you

have an understanding of what the sharial llaw means, you

wouldn't want that law in the United States either, especially

for the women. So but again, slumbering and sleeping would

have us in times like this. This shows us that

it's not about perfection again, but it's about preparation. Because

they all slept. We again live in a microwave generation.

People want everything quick, They want quick answers, they want

instant blessings. They want immediate results. If it don't happen now,

I don't want it now. But God doesn't always move fast.

Why because God moves on time, his time.

He know what tomorrow hoes.

He knows what we're going through, he knows what we're

dealing with, so he moves according to what he know

is best for us. It's not just his timing. He

knows what's best for us. We don't know what's best

for us. Look how mess up we sometimes mess ourselves up,

our lives. That's why we needed to save you, bunch

of messed up people. We still need to save you.

It's a messed up world. And while we're waiting, your

faith is being tested, your consistency is being tested, your

all is being tested. Some of us will also lose

the fire. We'll lose our fire because nothing happens when

we expected for it to happen. So you're living off

your expectations. Instead of saying, Lord, what would you have

me to do right now? If you the god that

knows the future, what should I be doing to wait

on what I'm praying for? Even with that, even if

you don't give it to you.

Though it tarries wait for it. At least go back

and pray a.

Couple more times, because Lord, I didn't hear you this time. God,

I'm unfor sure. But in the midst of some of

us losing fire, what we do again. We stop praying,

we stop seeking, we stop pressing.

Delay doesn't mean destroying you.

Delay is revealing you, because if you can take it

and make it through the delay, it reveals who you

really are. Because I'm not waiting on somebody else, I'm

waiting on the Lord. I'm not going ahead of God,

but I'm waiting on God to show me which way

to go.

Part of my.

Prayer is always, Lord, you be a lamping to my

footsteps and the light until my past show me the

way to go. I don't know which way to go.

I'm dealing with my business right now. That's been in

business for eighteen years. I don't know where it's going.

So my prayer has been to the Lord. Lord, you

got to show me which way to go. You showed

me this, because if you don't show me which way

to go, I.

Don't know which way to go.

And if I go where I think I should go,

I might it might not be you. It might not

end up being beneficial to me because you're not a

part of it.

But if you're.

All can't survive the delay, it won't sustain you in

the moment. You're all is what helps you to survive

the delay, and sustaining comes from God. And even God

is a part of our all. So there's some preparation

again that we have to do. My last points takes

us to You must be prepared before the door is closed.

It's a must be prepared. It is adamant that you

be prepared. If without preparation, you're not gonna make it in.

That's how this parable ends. When the cry came to

the When the cry came, the foolish realized that they

were not ready.

How many of us are not ready?

That should be a question now if we ask ourselves daily,

Lord if i'm because if I'm not ready, God, help

me to get ready. That's the thing about God. We

have a spirit, his spirit that lives inside of us.

The Holy Spirit is as real and as living as anything.

Holy Spirit, help me to get ready.

I don't want to be left behind. But not only

do I not want to be left behind, it's some

people I don't want to leave behind.

So me getting ready.

Can I also have to do with the people that

I witness, to the people that I share Jesus with,

the people that I allowed to see God's light in me,

Because sometimes they say, that's all they need is the light.

Let your light so shine before man, every man, that

they would see of God, they would see of your

good works, but they would glorify God because they know

it's not you. They have an understanding that that's God.

While they went by, all the bridegroom came and the

door was shut. They came later saying, Lord Lord, open

to us, but it was too late. We live in

a time where people think that they can wait till

it's too late. We have a bunch of procrastinators. I'm

asking the Lord to help me with that right now.

I always say the first sign of getting help us

to admit where we are, and that a lot of

people won't admit where they are, because to admit where

you are might mean you ain't all there, you ain't

got it all together. But God never caused us to procrastinate.

The Bible says the procrastination is like a sin. When

you study procrastination, why because you saying you can put

out today what you can do tomorrow, And you don't

even know if I promise you tomorrow. They don't even

know if you're gonna make it to tomorrow. So why

put out tomorrow to tomorrow?

What you can do today? Take that time?

Why and use it wisely? Spend that time with me

while we getting to know everybody on TV, every TV show.

I don't watch a lot of TV, so it's only

a few that I know. But when I hear people

talk about all the different TV shows, you watch all

the TV shows, you know everybody to play football, you

know everybody to play basketball, you know everybody that's on

the pricess right, whatever the show may be, you donna

spend time with them.

How much time have you spent with the Lord?

Not so that I can memorize this word, because that

was my fault in the beginning. I felt like I

had to memorize everything that was in the marble. Yeah

I can't bill Jack Moore. Yeah I try administer. I

can't build Jack mo that's that man's gift. Call out

them scriptures like that. But the more that I can

spend time in the word, the more that the word

can wash me, the more that I can spend time

in the Word. The more the word can purge me,

the more it can cleanse me, the more it can

give me an enlightenment of.

Who God really is. The more I get to know

ourb Father because he is the Word.

So as a world that's thinking we got to have

everything when we want it, we be then missed out

on what really matters the most, because when I leave,

I won't get to take no TV shows.

None of those.

Sports people are gonna go with me, y'all. I love

the cook used to so I take that back, thank you,

Holy Spirit. I used to love to watch the cooking shows.

They're not going with me.

It's not beneficial that I even have them. All those

TV shows, the Millionaire showeder where they're going by the hair,

that was my shows. So it's okay now to take

a break from those every now and then to spend

some time with the Lord. Still was too late for

the five foolish Angels because of their procrastination. This text

teaches us that something teaches us something very different.

It teaches us the word there is a deadline to readiness.

You can't borrow all. It teaches us that you can't

rush preparation. Either it might take more for you to

be prepared. It might take you spending some hours in

the world, it might take you spending some hours in prayer.

It might take you a real three day fast. But

that's your preparation. Don't rush it. You can't be reminded

of missed opportunities. You won't ever get that back. If

you missed that opportunity, you missed it. You can't go

back and get it. But those are opportunities that we

have before we missed them. It was the choices that

we made. Late preparation is ineffective preparation. You don't get

ready when he arrives. You must already be ready. Again,

as the Lord gave us when we started that Bible study,

it said get ready, stay ready, so.

We would be ready.

And that was through spending time with God. And my

conclusion that says that the ten the ten were invited,

All ten were invited, all ten were waiting, but only

five were ready.

And when the moment came.

Readiness made the difference between enter and in or being

shut out. Readiness made the difference between a celebration and

a separation, because they was going to a celebration.

This was the bridegroom.

They were headed to a big, nice, beautiful wedding, and

because they were not ready, they were separated. It from that,

many of us in the end will be separated. We

won't get to make it in And so it's important

that we understand that the final cause says, do I

have all in my vessel? Am I prepared for the delay?

And am I even ready right now?

And not later? The reason that.

This is a final call because that's questions that we

can ask ourselves. Where am I at? I know me

better than anybody, but I know where I'm at. God

knows me better than I know myself. And even as

I stated earlier, there are times when the Holy Spirit

will bringing for a conviction and we won't even heed

to it, whether the Holy Spirit tells us himself or

whether he sends somebody to us.

And we know just throughout scripture that there's many times.

That God said, I spoke to it, and they wouldn't

heed unto me even speaking to them.

So then I send them prophets.

In the Old Testament, they killed a lot of his

prophets because they went forth and told them what God

had said. I believe that we're in a time and

the error where we should ask God to help us

to be more sensitive and to the spirit, more sensitive

to his convictions, so that will heed to his convictions.

Because the thing that I love about my father the

most is he would not leave me in a place

of ignorance.

The Bible says that God wished.

That all souls would be saved. He not overlooking us,

He's not overlooking nobody else. We know what we're doing

is wrong. We know when we're not putting enough effort

into it. We know what we being lazy, we know

when we being procrastinated.

It's just sometimes nobody wants to admit to it. And

the thing about.

It is you don't have to admit it to nobody

but yourself. I don't understand the damage of it, betting it,

but I admit where I am.

So that God can help me get just a little

bit further.

God didn't save me for me to stay in the

same place, y'all. That should be a continuous growth, a

continuous maturity.

I think of.

People when they always put the stairs walking up to Heaven.

How about you put the stairs walking up to Jesus.

Because the Bible says that the more that we mature,

the more that we grow, our manifestation is will be

just like Christ. Our whole character has to change in

order for us to be just like Christ. How you

still gonna be mean, hateful, ugly, talking crazy to people.

And then say you Jesus right.

But people only depicting Jesus when they say, well, he

set with the sinners, he loved everybody, but not.

Depicting Jesus when they're supposed to look like him.

Because when Jesus sat with the sinners, he didn't set

with the sinners and watch them saying. He sat with

the sinners and gave him a word to bring them

out they sin. When he said I love you, he said,

I love you, but come out of your sin. A

lot of us won't even tell people about their sin.

Uh uh, because I don't want to judge. Nobody hedn't

called me to judge.

It ain't judgment. It's love. That's true.

Love loved them enough to not leave them there, loved

them enough to want them to go to heaven with you.

Don't keep getting yourself ready, but you won't help them

get ready.

All I'm gonna do is just sit with you.

I'm not gonna tell you how much he loved you

and how if you don't get it right, you won't

make it.

In That's what the wise virgins. That's why they told them, Oh,

I can't give you what I got. You gotta get

your own.

So when you sit with them, you don't just sit

there with them, you tell them you got to get

your own. That's not judgment, that's love. I'm gonna say this,

and then I'm really closing. I heard a woman on

the other day and it came from just probably another parable.

But there's people in hell, and why they're in hell.

Jesus allows them to look up.

When they look up and see that they're in hell,

they see a heaven. When they look in heaven, they

see all their friends, and they start saying, what help there?

If they knew that there was another place to go,

why didn't they tell me? You know, all this time

you've been working towards heaven. And because of the difference. Again,

there's nothing wrong with difference. There is two we have

to go according to the word. There's the sinner and

there's the same. Jesus came to die for our sinners.

But everybody's not accepting his gift. So that's not judgmental.

That's saying, baby, the same way that he saved me,

the same way that he sobered me up, the same

way that he picked me up out of the clay

and placed my feet on the solid ground, I want

that for you, the same way that he delivered me.

I want him to deliver you. So they said they

was looking up in their ASDs. Wow, did none of

them tell me?

That should be a question as we go before people

every day. I'm not saying that you got the constantly

go with folks with the word of God because you don't. Again,

by loving kindness, has God drawn them? I believe that's

God joined them. But your loving kindness should say, hey,

do you know the Lord? Or hey, if you don't

know the Lord, do you want to know the Lord?

And if they say no, that's fine. God don't force

itself on nobody. I'm not telling you to go around

and start snatching arms and saying, girl, you got to

get saved. You need to be saved. We all need

to be saved. But I'm saying you know something that

they don't know. That's why the gospel is called the

good News. It's good news that I don't have to

die and go to Hell. And I might have been

confused about that for a long time. I think I

was thirty two thirty three when I got saved. Yeah,

I've been saved now twenty three years, so it was

a while before I knew they understood that good news.

And I had people to come to me in witness.

I don't think I ever went off on nobody, but

I was not receiving of it. And for some of

them they came back, some of them they didn't. But

I thank God that that was a seed planet, because

for every seed planet, one is watered and then God

himself gets the increase. And here I am, I'm increased

of those watered seeds. I had people to come to

me and tell me about Jesus. I thank them that

they wasn't ashamed, that they didn't feel like they was

being judgmenttal tell me about me, Yeah, even though I.

Didn't like it.

Just think if something, if they hadn't told you or

hadn't told me. Just think if that person just praised

when they pray, they pray for all sinners, if that

person hadn't been praying, somebody was praying for me while

somebody was out so witnessing to me, not letting me

think that the life I was living was gonna get

me with God. Because you know, nowadays, everybody going to hell,

i' meant to heaven.

Everybody they mama going to heaven.

And I'm not saying that I'm putting nobody in hell,

but I'm saying that there's a place called Hell, and

from what the Bible teaches me, it's enlarging itself daily.

I didn't say that God did.

So if I know it's enlarging itself daily, then when

we have an opportunity to witness to somebody that you

don't have to go where is being enlarged, but you

can go somewhere where God is gonna accept you with

open arms, don't care about what you did, don't care

about who you did it to, what you look like.

Even the murderer has a chance to repent. So it's

not for us to say who's going where, But it's

for us that if we know, and we know somebody,

and they could even be like the five Foolish Angels,

they can be confessing salvation, but their outwards is showing

something different. Then let your outward be different from theirs.

Let them see that this is how true Christian acts,

This is what the true Saint does. This is how

we live, This is how we witness, This is how

we talk. Because we have a way of talking about ourselves,

we have a way of walking about ourselves. That's why

it's important to come from among them and be you separated,

because that gives them an opportunity to see a difference.

If all the saints look like the world, that I

would not even want to come to church. I could

just stay in the world. But when we come to church,

we want to see something different. So on today again,

I just want to encourage you to get ready and

stay ready so that you'll be ready