The Way of the Fool || RE(A)D Letters Pt.4 || Pastor Diego Mesa

I want you to stand on your feet as we normally do for the reading

of God's word. We are in a series this month called Red Letters.

Pastor Adam as well as Pastor Aaron have done a marvelous job. Pastor Adam

last week talked about letting not your heart be troubled, and Pastor Adam talked

about a city on a heell. Now, they had a bunch of props.

I'm not gonna have any props today. I'm not gonna use one.

Prop Number two is they smile a lot. This is the last smile that

you're gonna get from me, So take a picture of it. And they

have no wrinkles on their face. And I'm the wrinkly guy. So just

endure for me the next few moments. But let's read the Bible. Someone

from the crowd said to him, Teacher, tell my brother to divide the

inheritance with me. That's money, friend, he said, who appointed me

a judge and an arbitrator over you. He then told them watch out and

be on guard against all green because one's life is not in the abundance of

his possessions. Then he's gonna start to describe what greed looks like. Then

he told them a parable or a story a rich man. He had land,

and it was very very productive or profitable. He thought to himself,

what should I do? Notice this, Notice the eyes here? What should

I do? Since I don't have anywhere to store my crops? I will

do this, He said, Ah, We'll tear down my barns and build

bigger ones and store my grant at my I'm giving you an impression of where

I'm going right now. And it goes on and it says. Then he

said to himself, you have many goods stored up for many years. Man,

ticket easy, eat, be merry, enjoy life. But God said

to him, say this with me, these two words with me. Say

the next two words with me said okay, Now that was very very weak

for a Sunday morning. Okay, say it with some conviction. One,

two, three, Say it like you're saying it to your spouse. Say

that like you're really angry this very night. Your life is demanded of you,

and the things you have prepared, who's will they be? That's how

it is with the one who stores up treasures for himself and is not rich

toward God. You may be seated today I want to break down the way

of the fool, the way of the fool. Now here's the reality is,

is that a fool is like a noun, and foolishness is the adjective

or the action of that. And we can all be guilty. We've all

been guilty of being foolish, no question about that. But I don't want

to be guilty of being a fool. That's a vast difference. My actions

can temporarily, but a fool is someone who's permanent. And I don't want

to describe, And we're gonna go ahead. I don't want to be labeled

that, and we're gonna describe to you in a few moments what that looks

like. But when you think of a fool, what do you think about?

Do you think of a donkey? Do you think of a clown?

Do you think of a court gesture? Maybe you think of a character in

the Bible by the name of Solomon, who is highly intellectual, but he's

foolish in his ways. He is taught from a boy not to give your

sexual purity to a bunch of women, because they will influence your relationship with

God. He's a fool. He had a thousand women in his life.

Anybody here when I'm talking, He's the Wilt Chamberlain of his generation. He's

highly intellectual. So here's what you need to know. A fool is not

someone who's uneducated. A fool is not somebody who's quote unquote success not successful

because they have a lot of money, a lot of fame and fortune.

A fool is not somebody with a low IQ. A fool is somebody who

will not acknowledge or recognize that the blessings in his life have come from God.

A fool is somebody who does not recognize or acknowledge the will of God

for his life. And that's what the Bible begins to describe. Here's a

definition as I start off of what a fool is. The level of foolishness

in your life is based on the level you exclude God in your life.

The way we will act out foolishness is to the level that we will exclude

God from our dating lifestyles, from who I marry, my sex life,

how I spend my money, my choices and decisions will reveal the foolishness that

is in our lives. Last week, me and Lovely Cindy, we celebrated

our fortieth anniversary of being married together for forty years. So we went on

a cruise in Hawaii and we traveled all through the islands of Hawaiian really really

recaptured and rekindled, and I fell in love with this little white chick like

I did forty one years ago. And the amazing thing was is that we

were talking to one of our tour guides on one of the excursions and he

shared a truth with us, and I'd like to share with you. And

he said, if you ever go to a crowded beach and you see that

the parking lots are all filled, then all of a sudden, you see

one parking spot that's upfront, and you think that you're smart and you're gonna

park there. He said, when you park there. Before you park there,

look up, because you're parked under a coconut tree, and that coconut

tree can cause a lot of damage to you and to your vehicle. And

I think that's a great definition of a fool. We think we are getting

away with something, but it's our failure to look up and see the potential

damage of the future. And that's really what a great definition of fool is

we don't look up toward God. I don't acknowledge God's will for my life

and my choices and my decisions, and that's why it possibly can cause a

lot of damage in my life. Here are three opening things before we get

into the three main points that I read from this amazing story. Notice that

there is at least two brothers that are in a dispute and they want that

one of them wants Jesus to be an arbitrator settle the dispute. You will

know the strength of your family when you have to deal with financial inheritances.

I know what I'm talking about. I've done this a long time. I've

seen families that are all lovey, dovey, kiss kiss until a grandparent,

our parent dies and there an estate and the real motive of that family member

rises up. And today there are family members that aren't talking to each other

because they never got their grandmama's china, they never got the car, or

they never got the house. I will know the strength of my family,

my brother, my sister, when my mom and dad transition, my family

will know. I will discover their strength when me and Cindy go to heaven

and it's amazing how we let something as materialistic and superficial divide our families,

and that what was going on in this text. The second thing is,

it's amazing how we ask Jesus for his opinion, but if his opinion differs

from us, we won't accept it. We'll just go find someone else to

agree with us. And how many of you know the truth stands you will

if you search long enough, you will find someone to agree with you.

Just go on Facebook, Instagram, or Google it and you'll find some expert

that will tell you you're right. The reality is is they're asking him something

He knew the motive of their heart, and that's why he didn't give them

the answer, because that person had already made up their decision on what to

do. And it's amazing how we've already decided I'm going to marry this person

in spite of the wisdom and the council that's around us that says differently,

tell quiet, it's getting in here. That means someone's getting hit today,

right before in the forehead today. The third thing that I recognize here is

that Jesus uses two strong words. He says, be watchful and be on

guard. He could have just used one of them and it would have been

enough. But he used a double offense or a double defensive term. He

said, be watchful and be alertt Now you're smarter than me. You tell

me. Is that an offensive posture or a defensive posture? It could be

both, And maybe he's saying, you need to be both in your life

when it comes to greed, because it's very very powerful, and it's very

very sneaky, and you need to be watchful in your life and you need

to be alert from this subtle spirit called greed, because it's coveteousness, it's

selfishness, it's stinginess, it wants to control its competition, and it's envious

and we need to watch out for covet And then he draws this whole story

around greed. Now hearin, you need to understand, and I need to

understand. Greed is not just done when it comes to materialistic things. You

could have spiritual greed, You could have relational greed. You can have positional

greed. On your job. You covet someone else's parking lots, parking spot,

their title, You covet someone else's relationship. Why ain't my husband act

that way. Why don't my wife act that way? Why don't my children

act that way? It could go across the board. When he talks about

greed, I've been guilty of that. I have coveted another church in their

attendance. Well, I shouldn't say that. Let me be honest with you.

I've never a coveted attendance. I have coveted budget because a church our

side should be bringing way more money than that it does. But God supernaturally

sustaining that. There's a ton of people that make big money. They just

don't tie. And so when I hear of churches that are smaller than us,

and I hear their budget, a spirit of coveteousness could rise up.

That's another story. Let me go on. I love Billy Graham's definition of

what this looks like. Billy Graham said, envy and greed starve on a

steady diet of thanksgiving. It is hard to be greedy when you're a thankful

person. It reminds you of the dog that had a bone in his mouth,

and he's just a happy camper. As he's going along the lake with

his tail waggoning, his ears perked up and almost has a smile on his

face, and he's just walking along the lake until all of a sudden,

he looks at the lake and he sees another dog, and he sees another

dog with a bone in his mouth, and he goes all of a sudden

from being a happy, waggling tail dog to a jealous, coveting dog.

And now he drops the bone, and he starts growling at the other dog,

and he starts snarling at the other dog, and he starts barking at

the other dog, and he realizes that it's him he was barking at.

As the bone has swim away in the lake. We have to watch the

greed. Three things that's pointed out now when he describes a fool the way

of the fool, three things stand out out. The first thing that you

and I read in this text was this, he said within himself, and

he thought within himself, read I'll do it the way it was written.

He thought within himself, and he said, within himself, I'm doing so

good. I'm productive, I'm a great strategist, I'm scaling, and there's

nothing wrong with the production side and the prospering side. You begin to see

the foolishness in the statement he thought within himself, and he said within himself,

because I tried to point out to you when I was reading it,

all the eyes and all the miyes that were in there, and the way

of the fool is this. He lives a life that's totally independent of God.

He may believe in God, but when it comes down where the tire

meets the road, you don't see him honoring God. Because that's my money,

that's my tide, that's my marriage, that's my home, that's my

time. I'm stepping on a few toes this morning. He's living a total

end. He's not well. Nowhere in this text you see him. I

prayed and I asked God, should I open up another office? I prayed,

and I asked God? Should I hire someone else? I prayed,

and I ask God to leave me and guide me in my next business adventure.

We do not see him acknowledging God, welcoming God, inviting God,

including God, nor thanking God. He just gonna do what he wants,

whenever he wants, to whomever he wants, and no one ain't going to

tell him nothing because the degrees on his wall tell him he is qualified.

The pats on the back tell him he's qualified, the staff tells him,

and the zero's in his bank account will not zero, but the numbers in

the bank account tell him he's qualified. See where he's thinking, See where

he's taking his advice from himself. I'm going to make my own choice.

So I'm gonna make my own decisions on my spending habits, who I date,

who I marry, where my money goes. And God calls him a

fool because of that, an absolute fool. Because but this is what the

proverb says, which is a lot of scriptures that we've memorized. Trust the

Lord with all thy heart. And what does it say right here? Lean

not? He is say, lean on your own understanding. He said,

lean not on your own reasoning. Sometimes it works out, but sometimes it

doesn't because sometimes we're driven by emotions and we're driven by feelings, and sometimes

those can be unaccurate. We're making decisions out of retaliation, we're making decisions

out of anger, we're making decisions out of coveteousness, and those could could

be error and have us making mistakes in our lives. So we're leaning on

our own understanding. And that's basically what he's talking about. When he talks

about I thought, and I said, within himself, he has his own

self pleasures, self fulfillment, self gratification, self confidence, and self indulgence,

but he seems to lack self awareness. He just doesn't have a clue

in his life. And you know, if we want to a bookstore today,

I know there aren't too many around, but in a traditional bookstore,

you would see the self help section in the bookstore. How may you know

what I'm talking about? Self help? You know, one of the biggest

selling books are in the self help section. Everybody is buying self help books,

but it doesn't seem that anybody's getting help. You're reading and I'm reading

about self help. But our society gets worse, our marriage is worse,

our family gets worse, and we get worse. So here's the reality.

You and I don't need self help. We need God help. You can't

help yourself because you and I lean on our own wisdom and our understanding.

We need God to intervene, God to heal, God to exposed, God

to convict, God to correct, God to chasing whatever it looks like.

When you go to self help section, nobody goes to the section that says

help others. It's all about me, and we'd be better off if we

went and visited the I need God section and the helping others section rather than

the self help section in our lives. So I want you to recognize he

doesn't have a lot of self awareness in his life. There's a guy in

the Bible that kind of depicts this. His name is Nabel in the Bible,

and the Bible says that David, in his mighty men, as they

refuse it is from Saul, protected this large flock of sheep that ran the

hills side. They were owned by a man named Nabel who was very rich.

David would watch over them that when prey would come or a thief would

come, he'd run them away well upon the harvest and time for them to

be sheared, where Nabel would make money from the sheep's coat. David went

to him and he said, listen, I've been watching over your sheep.

I've kept them. You have them because of how we've watched over them.

My men are hungry. They haven't had good meals in a long time.

Would you just share a little bit of your profit, Would you just take

care of us kindly? For what we've done. We're not asking you for

a favor. We're just asking you to repay us for what we've done.

And Nabel says this, who is David, that's my money, that's my

sheep, that's my crop. Like we do with God and tithing, I

don't have to give God nothing. And this is what the scripture says right

here about Naball. It makes a swim statement. He is such a worthless

fool. Nobody can talk to him. He didn't acknowledge that the king was

watching over his goods. He just thought it was all me, myself and

I. The second quality that I look at in the way of the fool

was this quality. The way of the fool thinks and says that your security,

your comfort, your source, your identity, and your happiness comes from

your things, your stuff, your telling, your looks, the people in

your life, the possessions in your life, the productivity of your life,

and the power of your life. He uses this phrase, I'm doing so

good a build bigger. Why am I gonna build bigger? Because the biggerness

gives me more Comforteness gives me more security, the bigger gives me more identity.

At least he thinks that because he thought within himself, or he says

within himself, he thinks the biggerness of having more stuff is going to make

him more happier. Is he right? Three people said no. The rest

are unsure. He thinks that the people around him is his identity. He

thinks his popularity, his Facebook followers, he thinks the people that the amount

of people in the church validate him. But he's wrong because the reality is

this is that there have been many athletes who thought that their security was on

their talent and then they had a career ending injury and they are on the

front page of No Sports Illustrated anymore. They are business moguls that ran fortune

five hundred and fifty companies if that, who were caught in some form a

business malpractice and they're in prison today. They've lost their security. There's an

aging actor that was hot twenty years ago but now is overweight and aging and

no one is ringing the phone anymore. There's singers that have lost their pitch.

Where's their confidence, their security and comfort. There's preachers that have lost

their churches and their pulpit because of immorality. Where is their happiness and their

comfort? There's affairs that have taken place in a spouse's life and because of

that they have no more happiness. Or someone gets diagnosed with something, there

goes their comfort and there goes their security. I'm just trying to tell you

your identity, your confidence, your comfort, your security, and your happiness

is not in people and not in possessions. It's in your relationship with Jesus

Christ and him alone. The Bible says you are complete in him. I

could do all things through Christ, who strengthens me. Greater is he that

is in me than he that is in the world. Speaking of Jesus,

And as long as we make toys and people and looks and things are security,

then here's what's gonna happen. One day, you're gonna quit when you

lose it. One day you're gonna give up when it stops flowing in.

One day you're gonna put a gun to your head and you're gonna want to

commit suicide because you don't have a boyfriend or your husband left you. I'm

even knowing I'm talking about one day you're gonna become an alcoholic, an attic.

I'm not trying to be an evil. I'm not trying to be mean.

But this is the reality of the world. What would drive somebody who

is on the height of happiness and success to be in the valley of depression

is because their security and their confidence, and their identity and their happiness was

in someone other than Jesus, and their world came crumbling down when they lost

it. I'll never do that again. I quit, I give up because

your hope was in someone else, or in something else other than Christ.

And he says this, eat, drink and be merry. Man. It's

all good in the neighborhood. Get your groove on and get you as much

as you can. Life is sweet, you fool. It ain't gonna last.

How may you hear what I'm talking about? But that's the way he

thought My last comfortable. But there's another clown or fool in the Bible,

and that guy's name is Samson. And Samson had the looks, he had

the hair. But when the hair is cut off, no one thinks he

has the looks anymore. He's musclebound. No one is stronger than this dude.

But when he gives up his nazarethvite and loses his hair, he's a

normal man. And has no strength, he has a high IQ. He's

able to fool people with rutles. Now he's a stupid fool who's got his

eyes plucked out. The Bible says, who's chained and bound and he's grinding

at a millstone. He's forgotten about. I don't want to be that kind

of person. Neither do you. But he says, eat, drink,

and be merry. Here's the foolishness of that statement. Here's a foolishness of

a statement. The reality is this, I'm eating. Let's let's say,

let's go deep now into the emotion. What drives us? What emptiness?

What hole is in us that makes us hoard, stingy, selfish, covet

and it? What? What? What's the hole in you? Why can't

you be generous? What is it that that you can't be rich? What

is it rich toward God? What? What is it within you? Is

it you got your popsicles stolen from you when you were five years old?

Now and so you caught cove it and hoard everything? What is it somebody

didn't pat you on the back when you when you were you know, you

hit single and baseball and now you're driven to prove yourself. What what is

it? Why is it that you cannot acknowledge the beauty in yourself? And

you see, and I'm not here to talk about it. You just see

all these beautiful movie stars that just overdid plastic surgery. No, I'm not

making fun. Please, I'm not making fun of anyone in there. Don't.

But you know what I'm talking about, dude. You were beautiful and

even if you get a few wrinkles, and if you want to do whatever,

that's fine. But beauty's only skin deep. And you were always a

kind person and a loving person, a generous person. What is the emptiness

in my life? What is a hole in my life that says one service

is not enough. I have to have two services and two services not enough.

I have to have three services and three services not enough. I have

to have four services and five services is not enough. I have to have

five services and six services not enough. And I have to do seven services

a week. And I'm not gonna share the pulpit because the people are coming

to hear me, and if I share it with someone else and they don't

like them, They're gonna leave this church. Diego. Where did you get

that belief from because it's gonna drive you to cancer. You're gonna break down

your immune system and eventually it's gonna catch up with you. Why are you

so driven to perform? I know, lay me on the couch or the

doctor and tell me what my problem is. Eat, drinking me merry.

So here's where I was, Here's where you are at, Here's where this

guy is. I'm eating, but I'm still hungry, and I don't even

know what I'm hungry for. I'm drinking and consuming, but I don't even

know what I'm thirsty for. I think I'm happy, but then I hear

of something else and then I'm happy again. Or I'm only gonna be happy

when I get that next thing in my life, and happiness is Merriness has

become a fix for me by having things around me. It's something that you

and I have to be driven to look at inwardly and with an within our

hearts. I heard a story of Ted Turner. And Ted Turner, you

know, owns a ton of stuff CNN and so on, and baseball team

Lane of Brays and so on. So he gave one billion dollars to the

United Nations. I'm sure our missionarians would love at least a portion of that

billion. He gave one billion dollars. When the reporters came to him and

said, you know what, that is awesome. You know, thank you

for your generosity. How do you feel about giving a billion dollars to the

United Nations? He said, I don't feel very good because Warren Buffett gives

so much more money than I do, and it reveals the whole that's within

us. In the nineteen seventies and earlier, storage units did not exist in

our society. Come on, let's look at it. In the nineteen seventies

and beyond, you did not have a storage unit industry day. You want

to make a lot of money, buy some real estate, build a storage

unit, and you will do very very well, because it's a twenty four

billion dollar in this I don't need you to raise your hand and ask you

how many of you have a storage unit? And you don't know what that

heck I was about ready to cost. You don't know what the heck you

have in that storage unit, and you think you need it, but you

don't need it. But there's an emotional connection to having it around you that

makes you feel the garages field, the closets are filled. You have three

or four storages and what is it? They're things? And why did fifty

years ago people didn't need storage units and now everybody needs a storage unit?

Is what is a hole within us that has to hoard and covet more and

more and more and more? And think that is long as I have this,

I'm secure, I'm somebody. I'm confident. The last thing that I

look at and I'm done is the third thing that he Pois points out here

is that a fool is not rich toward God. You're not rich toward God?

Wow? What is that? Even? How many of you understand the

classification, the label, the scale of being called rich? When I say

rich, what what do you? What comes to mind? Does the does

thousands come to mind? Does millions come to mind? Do billions come to

mind? Okay? When I say rich, person, who comes to mind?

So what I'm trying to say, you have a way of identifying the

classification of rich? Don't you? You have a way? Then I I

need you to identify the classification of being rich toward God? Why do you

understand what it is to be material rich? And you don't understand or can't

comprehend what it means to be spiritually rich because our hearts are not invested in

that, and where our heart is, it reveals what we value. I'm

not talking about you, I'm talking to me. We're all hearing this together

today. So if we had classifications, let's say, and again I'm not

talking about anybody. I'm just using terminology that we can agree with. There

is the poor classification. Okay, when you think of poor, you think

of something. Okay, how many of you desire, ever since you were

an adolescent, have desire to be poor? That was your goal. I

can't wait to be poor. My pursuit is to be poor. Now,

one hand on his hand went up. It's true. But is it possible

that my pursuit is to be poor? In God? So let's go to

the next classification. There's poor, and we're just gonna you probably have better

ones than me. Poor. Then there's lower middle class. Okay, poor,

let's just say hardly makes nothing. Lower middle class twelve to twenty thousand

a year. I don't know, I'm just throwing numbers out. Middle class

okay, fifty seventy five, Okay, Upper middle class over one hundred thousand

dollars okay? And then rich is beyond? What classification can you put yourself

in? Spiritually? Where are you at? I know only old school people

know what that meant? Right there? Young kids? And what was he

doing with the finger up and walking like that? We then, how do

we define that? If I wanted to be materialistically upper middle class, middle

class are rich, I'd sit down with a financial planner and I'd spend time

with that. And I say, by the time I'm sixty five, me

and Cindy want to retire. He says, okay, good. How much

do you want to be living off of? Then? Do you want your

house or your debt paid off by then? Do you want a portfolio of

different assets that can take place so that one doesn't shut you down? Should

it not be productive? What do you want to leave your children? Okay?

What pleasurable things do you want to have acquired? Or vacations you want

to go? And how many of you know a financial planner will build that

and tell you what to work toward. I'm going to be your financial planner

right now when it comes toward being rich toward God. And I'm going to

ask you now to evaluate yourself in where you rank in being rich toward God

or the lower scale you're maybe poor or lower middle class. Because here's what

God scale when he says you need to be rich toward me. Well,

let me do this first. Here is where this man aired. This is

the three things that I believe he failed, And here were his three errors.

He built an earthly resume, not an eternal resume, and many people

have built amazing earthly resumes, but they wouldn't even know what an eternal resume

would look like. Number two, his worth was in his person, not

in his performance in the Kingdom of God. This one's huge that you understand

this. Everybody Christian and non Christian, in the eyes of God is worth

something, which you agree. You are worth something as a person, but

you may not be worth something in your performance in the Kingdom of God.

There's two different things. God says, I love you, and you are

valuable and worth a lot to me as a person, but in the performance

of the Kingdom of God, you ain't worth Jack Didley. Now, I

know that's hard to swallow and to do, but it's true. He loves

you as a person, he may not love you as your performance in the

Kingdom of God, and last of all and last of all, everything he

prepared for was now gone, and he made no preparation for the eternal future.

So here is how we are going to be rich toward God. This

is it. Here's the The list goes like this. You are rich in

mercy and forgiveness. You have a high pain tolerance, you walk in love.

You forgive people, and you know what, you show a lot of

them. I know there's consequences sometimes, but you're not bent toward judgment right

away. I want to be merciful. Jesus was merciful to me. I

don't want to be quick to judge. I want to give people second chances

in some areas of my life. Then I want to be rich in generosity,

service, and good works. I want to be rich with my money.

I'm going to be rich with my time. I want to be rich

with my talents in giving them away. I want to be rich in kindness

and caringness. I feel empathy, sympathy, concern. I want to be

rich in my relationships and my friendships. I want to die alone with five

people who show up for my funeral. I want great relationships and friendships I

want a great character and integrity, my honesty, my trust worthiness. Next,

I want to be rich in family and home life. I want to

be rich in my responsibilities and my commitments. My yays or yays. My

nays are nays, and you don't have to worry about me. I keep

my vows. I want to be rich in my faith and rich in believing

the Bible. I want to be rich in endurance, perseverance, and patience.

I want to be rich in patience. Got to wait on the Lord.

I gotta wait on people. Some people take longer than others to to

surrender their life to Jesus, or to live out their faith, or or

get victory in their lives. I want to I want to be I don't

want to give up so quickly when things don't go my way. I want

to be tough against hardships and challenges that I just don't quit and give up.

And last of all, I want to be rich in humility and rich

in holiness. I think that's what God's portfolio would look like, that he

would strive for us to be and to be rich toward God. I want

to end with this. I want to end with this. When I was

a teenager. There was a television program called The A Team that was real

famous at that time, and there was a guy named mister T and he

had this line, I pity the food. Anybody remember that one? I

pity the fool. Then in the black culture, I've heard all my life,

because I was raised in the Black church, this statement, Mama didn't

raise no food. I told you what I am. I'm a black sagin

so I could go black and Mexican at any given moments. Just switch my

highbred. Very very few of us unicorns. Adam thinks he ain't no high

bred. He's a wanna bee. He married someone black. But that boy

is as white as can be. Ya, don't tell he's probably he's somewhere.

I know that guy's got ears all over the place. I'm just choky,

No I'm not. But anyways, I don't even know what the heck

I was talking about. Oh yeah, yeah, MoMA didn't raise no fool.

Okay, yeah, so you're familiar with that term. Okay, but

I want to take you back to about seventy five, one hundred years ago,

maybe not even that long, but a long time ago, there was

a four letter word that was equal to our four letter word that you would

call somebody that was highly offensive, and it was the word fool. It

was degrading. If you labeled me that and you called me that, it

represented something that I did not want to be. Today, it's a word

of acceptance today young people. You fool, you fool, you fool,

you clown about it. But there was a generation that rejected that word as

though you were saying a dirty word to them. Our society has drastically changed

in our foolish ways have now become the label of what we accept. But

I want to end with this. They're gonna show you a picture of me

that Cindy took. This is me. Notice my face, it's not a

happy face. This was in July when we were in San Diego as we

take our vacation and we always go to a Padre game, that's what we

do. And so I could not find my San Diego Padre T shirt and

so she said, oh, I've got a Padre T shirt and I'll loan

it to you. I said, I don't want to wear a chick T

shirt. She said, it's not it's unisex. So I just got it

and I put it on and the moment I put it on and saw my

cleavage, I said, what gut? I was about ready to be said,

no, no, let me at least get a picture of it with

you. My wife was gonna let me walk out into the public stadium wearing

that shirt. I promise you I wouldn't. I would have not come home

with Cindy. I would have come home with someone else if I went there,

it wore that shirt. Take it off, now, take it off,

Take it away. Sometimes we do foolish things. Take it off the

moment you do it. Don't let it stay on you and walk around as

proudly as can be that you're a fool because everyone's laughing at you. Take

it off. It doesn't fit. You're a Christian, You're a christ follower.

You're a new creature in Christ. Jesus, you've been transformed. Father.

I thank you today for the message. I pray it resonates in our

hearts. May we walk away have learning from this story of God. We

don't want to reason within ourselves. We don't want our security to come from

this world and God. We want to be rich towards You. We thank

you for that. In Jesus' name, amen, I'm gonna ask that nobody

move. Everyone hold their seat. In a few moments, we'll let you

go and will pray us out together. Your movement can disturb what God is

about ready to do today. There's a scripture found in the Bible and it

says this. The fool says in his heart there is no God. A

fool says in his heart, there's no God. God also labels somebody a

fool who does not recognize that he's God. Let me tell you what God

does that no other theologian, philosopher, theorist, guru or small g God

can do. God is the only one that can heal a soul, deliver

a soul, save a soul, and forgive a soul. Other people could

do all other things. But only Jesus is exclusively, absolutely and definingly can

do those characters. That's why he said, I am the Way, the

truth, the life. No man comes to the Father. I am the

only one that can deliver a soul that's bound by shame and guilt in the

past. I'm the only one that could heal a broken heart and give you

a second chance. I'm the only one that could save you from your greatest

sins of torment. And I'm the only one that can could forgive you of

iniquities that you can't forget for amazing characteristics that our God can do that no

one else can do. No works, no seminar, and no degree can

do those things. But I love the one that touched my heart when I

was a teenager, which was the forgive. And I appreciate a heel delivered

and say, but the one that touched me was that he forgave me because

those are the way That's how I was wired. I carried the things that

I did on my shoulders, and because I carried them, I acted had

to act out what I did well how I felt. So I drank too

much, and I cussed too much, and I fornicated too much, and

I fought too much. Because I have unforgiveness in my life. I have

shame, guilt, condemnation, regret, and embarrassment that won't go away.

And so I carry this cloud of unforgiveness in my life because I don't know

what it is to be given and to have everything I've done forgotten and washed

away. So when I said that one simple prayer, I wept uncontrollably because

it felt like something broke off of me that I was carrying. He took

it away. And today I don't know if that's what it is for you,

or if it's more of the healing, delivering or saving side. But

only Jesus is the one that can remove, change, heal and deliver a

soul and a person. And you say, without a shadow of a doubt,

I don't know what it is to wake up one morning and not have

regret, shame, guilt, condemnation in my life, and to have that

heaviness lifted from me is something that I would forever be grateful for and want.

Or you say, without a shadow of a doubt, I'm a Christian,

but I'm not serving the Lord as I should, and I've been writing

defensive compromis has to tell me I'm living is wrong. I know what I'm

doing is wrong, and I just feel the need to get right and rededicate

my life to the Lord. Hands are gonna go up all across this auditorum

in a matter of moments, and we're gonna pray for you. It's not

important that I see your hand. It's important that Jesus sees your hand.

Because you're acknowledging him in front of a bunch of people today. One two.

I want you to raise your hand for Jesus today to accept that forgiveness

or rededicate your life. One two three, raise your hand all across this

auditorum, wherever you are. If you're raising your hand, do one more

thing. Just stand up for Jesus. If you had the courage to raise

your hand, have the courage now to stand up for the one that stood

on a cross and he shed his blood and he died for you. Today

you stand up, and you standing up is a declaration. It's a profession

identifying with him. Say this with me, dear Lord Jesus, a bunch

amongst all these people. You know who I am. You know me since

I was in the valley of my mother. Today I recognize I need you

and you're the only one that can forgive me, save me, heal me,

and deliver me. From this moment forward, I don't want the life

that I was living. Would you come into my heart be my Lord and

savior. I believe you died from me, and from this moment forward,

I will serve you all the days of my life. Amen. Let's thank

God, pastor Adam