Don't Stop Too Soon-Pastor Bryan Stewart

Thank you so much for allowing me to be up here.

I know pastor doesn't let just anybody take his pulpit.

So it's an honor the fact that I get to stand

before you this morning and bring the word.

When he asked me to do it,

it's a very nervous and stressful thing.

There's a lot of weight that's carried

when you have to give a sermon to so many others

that I'm not worthy to preach to.

Right, and I'm so very blessed to have

Gene and Betsy Rice overseer

and just a powerful couple in my wife's life

and now in mine.

So thank you so much.

Now I got my crying out of the way.

Are you guys ready to hear the word this morning?

I feel like the Lord has given me a word

that he placed on my heart in the middle

of some catastrophe this morning, this week.

Most of you know that there's been some things

that's gone on in our little family

and not only ours but have touched other families

that man, I'm thinking what else?

Lord, please stop.

I don't need no more, right?

But I'm so thankful to be here in front of you this morning

and I feel like my heart and my mind is equipped

and prepared to bring the word that God has laid on my heart.

I'm gonna be preaching out of Joshua this morning,

chapter six.

Now I'm gonna be reading verse one through five

and then I will skip down and read verse 20

of that same chapter.

Real quick, if you guys will entertain me,

I'm gonna do something that I started doing

in youth group this past Wednesday.

Clap twice if you can hear me.

Clap twice if you can hear me.

Clap twice if you can hear me.

All right, I think we're awake now.

We're ready to go, right?

Joshua chapter six, verse one.

Now Jericho was straightly shut up

because of the children of Israel.

None went out and none came in.

And the Lord said unto Joshua,

see I have given into thine hand Jericho

and the king thereof and the mighty men of valor.

And ye shall compass or march around the city

all ye men of war and go around about the city once.

Thus shalt thou do six days

and seven priests shall bear before the ark

seven trumpets of ram's horns.

And the seventh day ye shall compass the city seven times

and the priest shall blow the trumpets.

And it shall come to pass that when they make a long blast

with the ram's horn and when ye hear the sound of the trumpet

all the people shall shout with a great shout.

And the walls of the city shall fall down flat.

And the people shall ascend up every man

straight before him.

Now skipping down to verse 20.

So the people shouted when the priest blew the trumpets

and it came to pass when the people heard the sound

of the trumpet and the people shouted with a great shout

that the wall fell down flat so that the people

went up into the city every man straight before him

and they took the city.

Father, I love you today and I thank you for the opportunity

to bring forth your word to break the bread of life.

And I have done so Lord I pray that you would bless it.

That ears would hear what your spirit is saying

and that you would use me as the vessel in this hour

to bring forth your word according,

that would be glory and bring glory to you.

In Jesus name I pray, amen.

You can be seated.

The obvious theme of this scripture seems to be

don't stop too soon.

Football games are not won in the first quarter.

Baseball games are not won in the first inning

and a hunter doesn't go out and get his prey

on the very first hunt most of the time.

For me I was fortunate enough to do that

but that doesn't happen most of the time.

Your wall may not fall down the first time

you march around it.

The principle of complete obedience is introduced

in this story and continues to reverberate

throughout the word of God.

We see it in name and the leper dipping seven times

in the Jordan River, the blind man washing in the pool

of Siloam and the man with the withered hand

reaching out and being healed.

The point is that obedience is better than sacrifice.

Without fail, victory comes on the heels of obedience.

So it is with the Jericho story.

There are a few things that we must take notice

in this story.

First thing we take notice of is the people.

These were the Israel people led by Joshua.

They approached this city called Jericho.

They had done the work and done the job

to scout the city to see what is to be seen of the city.

But it says that Jericho, the very first scripture says

that Jericho was straightly shut up.

Nothing came in and nothing came out.

And I think that's significant.

Because we get to see how the reputation

of Israel proceeds itself.

We get to see how the people and the men and women

of God proceed itself.

The word had reached Jericho.

That the Red Sea was parted on behalf of God's people.

That the Jordan River was split on behalf of God's people.

That they had overthrown and plundered Egypt

and the Israelites and they had destroyed

the Amorite kings, Sahan and Oog.

It's obvious that Jericho, to Jericho,

that these are the chosen people of God

with a touch on their life.

But when was the last time your city was so affected

by the church's reputation?

When was the last time anyone stood up and took notice

when the name of the church was mentioned?

Nowadays we have a tendency to do church

but we don't act like the church.

Can I get an amen?

Y'all got real quiet on that one.

But it happens sometimes, don't it?

Sometimes we're too busy wrapped up in doing church

that we forget who the church is

and we forget who we are as a men and women of God

and we forget what our job is to do on this earth.

But these people in Jericho, they heard the reputation.

They knew who was coming for them.

They shut the city down to lock it down

the way nobody gets in and out

because they were afraid of what would happen.

But ye are a chosen generation,

a royal priesthood, a holy nation,

but peculiarly people that you should show forth

the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness

and into his marvelous light.

Christians, we are the people that God has chosen

to move through this world

and to make a difference in this day.

The second thing you need to realize in this story

is they had a problem.

Jericho was a city to be conquered.

It had massive walls all around it.

There were guards that stood atop the walls

ready to pour cauldrons of hot liquid on them

as they tried to scale the walls.

They had armed guards all around.

There were no weak places in the wall.

You couldn't break through it.

You couldn't chisel through it.

You couldn't climb over it.

Jericho was well defended.

The only way they're getting in is a miracle,

is a miracle that God would perform.

These walls in this story

speak of our own difficulties in life.

We have our own walls and our own barriers

that stand between us and the promise of God,

between us and where God's trying to take us.

Satan always has a fortified wall.

It doesn't matter.

You break one wall down and another wall pops up.

It seems like time and time again,

you think you're headed in the right path.

You think you're headed the right way.

Wall, break it down.

Wall, break it down.

Wall, break it down.

Am I preaching to anybody but myself?

I felt like that's been me this week.

We get over one obstacle, bam, another obstacle.

We get through that obstacle, bam, another obstacle.

Isn't that how the enemy works?

He wants to keep us distracted, keep us busy,

keep us so focused on his wall

that we forget what's on the other side of that wall.

And we forget that we need God in the situation.

We need God in the circumstances

to help break through that wall,

to deliver us to what God has called us into.

See, your perception of the wall is the key.

If you view it as an impossibility, you will lose.

If you view it as an opportunity for God to move, you win.

For with God, nothing shall be impossible, Luke 1.37.

The third thing we realize is that there was a plan.

In this story, there was a plan.

Once a day, God said,

march around the walls in this order.

Armed men, seven priests,

with the Ark of the Covenant and the rear guard.

On the last day, march around these walls seven times.

The plan that God gave them was very specific.

And God always does things very carefully, doesn't he?

There's no haphazard reason.

There's no throw it out and see what sticks.

God has a plan, and it's a very careful, very detailed plan.

And our obedience is what's gonna bring forth that miracle.

And what happens a lot of times is we get too impatient.

We're too busy wanting the victory

that we forget that there's a plan along the way.

And that God's plan is what's best for our life, not ours.

We get so focused on the end result

that we forget how to get there.

Or we don't listen to the instructions

on how to get there.

Our impatience, we wanna skip the plan

and go straight to the theory.

But throughout the Bible,

you will find many if and then promises.

What that means is you do this and God does this.

If I do this, then God will do this.

If my people, which are called by my name,

shall humble themselves and pray,

and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways,

then will I hear from heaven, I will forgive their sin,

and I will heal their lands.

If ye abide in me and my words abide in you,

ye shall ask what you will and it shall be done unto you.

If ye have faith as a grain of a mustard seed,

ye shall say unto this mountain,

remove hence to yonder place and it shall remove

and nothing shall be impossible to you.

If the plan is working, leave it alone.

Leave it alone.

God's got the plan.

We don't have the plan.

We're to execute the plan.

We're to be obedient unto God and what he's asked us to do

and ask us to do in that order.

And if we're in that plan or follow that plan,

we will see the victory, amen?

I'm victorious because God's leading my life,

because he has the plan.

All I have to do is execute the plan, amen?

The fourth thing you understand is the power.

The place of the ark in this story is significant.

The ark wasn't at the front of the battle or the march.

The ark wasn't in the rear.

The ark was in the center of the plan.

We must have God in the middle of our fight,

in the middle of our battle, in the middle of our march.

God must be in the center of it.

Some people are marching without God.

They're praying, they're seeking,

they're crying out to God for all these things,

but they're on their journey without him,

without him at the center,

without him in the middle of their circumstances,

without him in the middle of everything they're going through.

We must place God in his rightful place

in the middle of our situation,

in the middle of our heart and soul,

in the middle of our mind.

We must place God there because he has the plan.

We can't follow the plan unless we have the spirit of God with us.

And the ark represented that spirit of God.

And that spirit of God must live inside of us.

It must be in the center of us.

It must have ears to hear the direction of the plan,

the way God would have us go.

The power must be inside of you. Amen?

Amen.

In church sometimes,

God's not in a lot of our plans.

God's not in a lot of our plans.

We have events, we have concerts,

we have all kinds of things that draw attention.

But it seems too often time the attention is brought to the church,

not where it belongs.

Because God gets the glory, God gets the honor, God gets the praise.

And he has to be at the center of everything we're doing.

As a church, this movement wasn't founded on big churches or fancy buildings.

This movement was founded upon God and transforming people's lives.

When we take God out of the equation,

when God's not the center focal point of everything we do,

we get distracted and we lose those battles.

Walls get thrown up that we can't knock down.

Fifthly, the praise, one of my favorite parts.

In Joshua 6, chapter 16, it says,

Shout for the Lord hath given you the city.

This is a praise before the fact.

This is a praise before the victory was won.

This was a praise that would have a ripple effect that would cause the victory.

But the praise happened before the victory. Amen.

Praise is one of the purest forms of faith that I know of.

Ask for it, then praise God for it.

Don't wait on the victory, ask for it and praise God for it.

Begin to praise God for the family that needs salvation, for your family.

Begin to praise God for the fact that I need a job with better pay and better benefits.

Begin to praise God for a healing that I haven't gotten yet.

And watch what God's going to do.

When he's in the center, when he's the focal point,

you're following his plan and you praise him before the victory comes.

Victory is sure to come. Amen.

Because our faith is not in us alone.

It's not in our plan. It's not in our ideas.

It's in God and his plan and purpose for our life, as long as he's in the middle.

The prize.

It has been said to the winner goes the spoils.

But in this story, it's very significant to understand that.

Some of us in life, we march and march and we struggle.

And we finally get the breakthrough.

We finally get that answer that we've been seeking so hard for God for.

And we mistake the curse for the blessing.

And we take what's temporal and we think that's the prize.

What I mean by that is.

Everything in the city, God said to do what?

Burn it all. Don't save anything.

They didn't take no gold. They didn't take silver.

They didn't take the garments. They didn't take the animals.

They they destroyed it all when the walls finally fell and they destroyed it all.

They didn't take anything because the blessing wasn't the riches that Jericho had.

Sometimes we mistake the blessing for to be the thing.

That's the obstacle that we're supposed to get to.

It's important to note that in the story that those items,

those temporal things was not the blessing.

That was not it. It was the eternal things.

What were they trying to do?

They were trying to get to Canaan land, the milk, the land flow with milk and honey.

They were trying to get there.

Jericho was the obstacle that was in the way.

God was trying to tell them, don't worry about what's there.

I will provide for you over there.

But I got to get through this city. I got to get across this wall.

I got to get through this next obstacle to get where I'm supposed to be.

Because the promise of God, God had commanded Joshua and Israel to burn it all.

And they did that. What's the purpose?

All these things were tainted and tarnished by the evil,

idolatrous ways of Jericho.

The real prize was what was beyond Jericho.

You must go through Jericho to get to Canaan.

This week in my life, that's what I felt like.

I'm here at the church studying, preparing to preach a sermon.

And I leave to here for a couple of hours.

I leave to head home and Eric is there and the kids are outside playing.

And and halfway home, I get the phone call.

When you get here, come straight to the garage.

Nieland's had an accident and I didn't know what happened.

She sounded distraught and upset, though, so I knew it had to be important.

So I get home to see what I saw.

You guys have seen me and he's pretty banged up.

He's been a tough guy, but he's pretty banged up.

Kids will play, but it wasn't just that thing.

In my mind, it's another wall.

It's another distraction.

It's another tactic of the enemy to prevent me from focusing on what

I have to do here in front of you this morning.

Because earlier in the week, we had a pool party at my house.

You guys know about it.

I made an announcement about it behind the behind the pulpit.

And poor Olivia and Landon were playing in the pool.

Bad things happened.

Somebody pushed me in anyway.

Poor Landon ended up breaking her teeth off and Olivia's forehead.

It's terrible.

So that was Sunday.

Then we moved on to later in the week.

He got neither.

And I'm thinking, I got three kids.

These things come in threes.

Oh, no, I'm like, Carson, Lord, come here.

Let me get the oil, honey.

I'm a pray.

But the three was Olivia.

I think we've been praying for you.

All right.

Luckily, they're all recovered.

Got nothing.

I mean, everything's fine.

Right.

But isn't that how the enemy works?

We're focused and have our minds set on something so great, so faint.

There's nothing better than sharing the word of God.

There's that.

And there's too many ministers in the house that know what I'm talking about.

There's nothing better.

Eric can tell you I've struggled at work.

I don't want to be at work.

All I want to do is this.

It's gripped me.

And that's a wonderful thing.

That's a beautiful thing.

But I still have to work.

But the enemy has used so many things to distract not only me, I'm sure everybody

in here has a story they could tell.

But when I began to think about that and I came in here Thursday and I was

thinking, what am I going to preach?

What Lord give me a nudge?

Give me something to go.

And I read over this Jericho story before I go and find out we're going to the ER

because Neil and direct is back.

And I'm thinking, here's another wall.

This is exactly what it's like.

Wall after wall after wall.

But the one thing that I do have going for me is God is in the center.

Can I ask, can somebody praise him this morning?

Because God is in the center.

So I don't have to worry about anything going on.

I don't have to worry about a wall after a wall after wall.

God's going to kick that wall down.

And I love what the Bible said.

The Bible said the walls fell flat, not in a pile of rubble, not that they could come

years later, archaeologists and uncover the wall.

As a matter of fact, I Googled it.

They can't recover the wall.

It's gone.

When God does something in your life, he does it totally.

It's a total transformation.

It's exactly what God has planned for your life.

Every wall that's popped up in front of you, every distraction that the enemy tries to

do, keep on keeping on.

That's all I have to say is don't stop.

Keep digging.

Keep chugging.

God's inside of you.

He's leading it.

He's got the plan.

All you have to do is execute that plan and God will come out.

You will come out because of God and he'll be glorified through it all.

Can you praise him in this house tonight?

Today.

And it's okay to share.

For me, it's okay to share those struggles that we have, right?

Because I know I'm not alone.

We all go through things in life, but the answer is still the same no matter what we do.

And that's the beauty of the God we serve.

The answer is still the same.

I tell the kids that and youth all the time, we win.

We win.

There's a, you talk about a plan.

There's a plan.

And all we have to do is follow and execute the plan and keep God in the center and we win.

I like winning.

I like when I played football in high school, I liked winning.

Didn't do a lot of that, but I liked winning.

We all like winning.

Nobody wants to lose.

Nobody plays a game to lose.

This is not a game, but you see the analogy.

It's important.

It's eternal.

Keep God in the front.

So what we see in this story is number one, that Jericho had a problem.

The problem with the men and women of God and Joshua headed their way.

That was the problem because the reputation preceded itself.

They knew who was coming.

And another beautiful thing in this story is that the Canaanite gods that they were praying to,

how do you think they felt?

Right?

Their walls fell flat and the people of Israel took the city, the Bible says.

They didn't have it handed to them.

They took it.

The Canaanite gods couldn't do nothing about it, but the God we serve, because those men and women of God

followed his plan, kept him at the center, and they had the victory.

First thing they had was the problem, which was Israelite people headed their way.

The second thing they had, I'm sorry, the first thing they had was the people.

The second thing they had was the problem.

The problem was the fact that Jericho was the wall that Israelite people had to go through.

They were on their way.

The third thing we understand is the plan.

God gave them the plan.

God told them, if you do this and do this, you'll have the victory.

And they did that.

They followed the plan.

That's what we must do in our lives.

Fourthly, they found the power.

And the power was that the Ark of the Covenant was where God had designed it to be,

at the center of that march.

The power of God, the spirit of God that lives inside of us, needs to be at the center of everything we do.

Of our heart and our lives, guiding our minds, guiding our soul, in every situation, every circumstance.

Pray first, do second.

We don't know what to do unless we've prayed and sought God for the answer and for direction.

Amen?

Fifthly, we have the praise.

And that's where we praise Him and worship Him.

That's one of my favorite things to do.

Y'all know that because you see me up here singing it every Sunday.

But I love to praise and worship.

But we praise and worship Him even before the victory is won.

Because we have faith and believe that the victory will be ours.

Amen?

And then lastly, the prize.

The prize is not gold, silver, things of this world.

The prize is, in their case, was Canaan land.

But for us, it's that we make it home one day.

To be with Him eternally in heaven.

You guys can stand.

I'm going to close.

That was one of the fastest sermons I've ever preached.

But I got you out of here early.

The prize is that we make it to Streets of Gold one day.

That's the definition of success.

That we make it there.

And like that song says, that we see those who have gone before.

And we get to experience heaven eternally with our lost loved ones.

Our people we've never met.

That's the goal, right?

To get there.

That's what I'm looking for.

I'm looking to get there.

Get to heaven.

And I want to crowd heaven.

I want to make heaven not only stand in room only, because let's be honest.

We ain't going to be sitting.

I want to make heaven so crowded and so overpopulated.

And I hope that all of you do, too.

And we can do that by just following God's plan.

Let him be the center of our life and follow his plan.

Don't settle for the temporary glory of an immediate conquest, but look ahead to the real prize that awaits those who obey God.

He that overcometh shall inherit all things.

And I will be his God and he shall be my son.

That's in Revelation.

The end's coming near.

And he shall be my son.

Some of you may be struggling tonight or today for with some walls of your very own.

I have no doubt that there are those of you all across this congregation that have those walls and that are struggling with those walls.

So the question then becomes, do you have the plan?

And if you have the plan, is God in the center of that plan?

Maybe God is. Maybe it's not that God's not in the center or that you don't have a plan.

Maybe you have a plan and you're a man and woman of God, so God's in the center.

But we get a little impatient at times.

We want the end result now.

We live in a very fast paced drive-through world.

We want it now.

But sometimes there's something in the way, Ken.

There's something in waiting on God's answer.

There's something in waiting on the Spirit of God to move in your situation.

There's something about that.

And maybe that's you. Maybe just the patience is a struggle.

It's hard to deal with. I know it was for me.

God taught Erica and I so many valuable lessons about patience early on in our marriage.

But if that's you, if you're struggling with those walls and you just need a little encouragement today, I'd love to pray for you this morning.

I would love to seek God with you on behalf of those circumstances, those situations, those things that you're going through.

And ask God to give you that patience.

Give you that plan to center yourself.

If you don't know God, if you don't know Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, I will always invite those of you who want to get to know him to come this morning.

I would love to help you meet our Savior.

I've been in the place within the past probably six months where I didn't know what the answer was.

I had God in the center, but I didn't do my very best most of the time.

What I mean by that is the enemy, there's so many ways he can distract you and play with your mind and make you think things that aren't true.

And I don't want to fall for it because you're wrapped up in the emotions of life.

So there's times that I was struggling in and of myself dealing with those same things.

Like, God, I don't see your plan.

I'm following you.

I'm trusting in you.

You're at the center, but I don't see the plan.

But then in good timing, like God always does, he reveals himself to us when the time is right.

And then you look back and you're like, why didn't I see it before?

But it's all part of the plan.

Sometimes in life, that's where we're at.

We don't know which way to go.

We don't know.

It seems like our mind and our body and our daily lives are just in.

It's in repeat over and over again.

Wake up, work, home, go to bed, wake up.

It's a repeat. It's a repetitive thing.

And all the while we're searching for that specific job, that specific task that God has for us to do.

Or we're searching for a specific answer to the specific problem.

It's so very important that you just wait and keep trusting and relying on God.

Those of you who would come help me pray.

Hope for all I do.

Jesus, you're the center of my joy.

Jesus, you're the center of my joy.

All that's good and perfect comes from you.

You're the heart of my contentment, the hope for all I do.

Jesus, you're the center of my joy.

Jesus, you're the center of my joy.

All that's good and perfect comes from you.

You're the heart of my contentment, the hope for all I do.

Jesus, you're the center of my joy.

All that's good and perfect comes from you.

Jesus, you're the heart of my contentment, the hope for all I do.

Jesus, you're the heart of my contentment, the hope for all I do.

Jesus, you're the heart of my contentment, the hope for all I do.

Jesus, you're the heart of my contentment, the hope for all I do.

Jesus, you're the heart of my contentment, the hope for all I do.

Jesus, you're the heart of my contentment, the hope for all I do.

Jesus, you're the heart of my contentment, the hope for all I do.

everybody can come up. I would like to pray over you guys

because we're starting back school. It's difficult time for

the students difficult for the teachers and I would love to

pray a prayer over you and everybody that would come help

me pray these kids need our prayers and these teachers need

our prayers. The parents need our prayers. This is when the

water gets full right? They go through things as these high

schoolers and middle schoolers even college students go

through things that I can't say that I've experienced them

going through the same thing but it's detrimental enough

that they need the hand of God over them. They need that a

hand to walk with them each and every day. I'm waiting on

everybody to get up here because there's a few that had

to come off the balcony but we're going to get them all.

This is one of the most important things we can do as

as parents as grandparents as as leaders in the church is pray

for our young kids. It doesn't matter the age but it's one of

the most important things we can do because that's the next

generation right? They're going to be us in the coming years

and coming decades. They're going to be bringing their own

group in so it's so very important that we do this and

those of you that would please help pray father in Jesus name.

I ask that you would cover each and every student each and

every teacher with your hand God in your power. Lord let just

cover them with a cloud of protection Lord of mighty heads

that the enemy cannot pierce and Lord as there as things are

brought to them Lord that are evil as the enemy tries to

tempt them in ways that that they can't even and we can't

even comprehend father. I'm believing that your protection

will be with them. I'm believing that their hearts and

their minds and their bodies will be shielded from the

temptations of the enemy and from the temptations of

anything evil that would come their way father. I pray that

they would learn that they would grow God that the teachers

will be protected and God that you'd be with each and every

one of them as they go throughout their day to day and

father may you protect them may you keep them may encourage

them may you speak to their heart and minds and minister to

them. Let them be a light and a beacon wherever they are to

the school to the community to the county to other teachers

and let the teachers be a light and to the students and

father we are believing for your protection. We are believing

that they will be alright in Jesus name. I pray. Amen give

the Lord praise.