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Fasting returning to our first love | Ps Ronson

Acts Nilai

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  1. You're listening to a message to go from axt church.

  2. We hope this message will light up your day.

  3. Chronous time and also the chiros time. What is the difference.

  4. Chronos time is like sequence of time in chronology, your

  5. calendar date, your calendar money. So today it's I can't

  6. remember the ten August, is it? Yes, Today's ten August.

  7. So that's a chronous time for you. But as people

  8. of God, being in the Kingdom of God, we should

  9. also recognize the chiros time of God, meaning at appointed

  10. time of an appointed moment. So when we say that

  11. we are calling for forty days fast from seven August

  12. to fifteenth September, it can some may see it as

  13. a chronous time because it's August to September. But if

  14. you really want to seize your moment with God, you

  15. want to seize your appointed time with God, You've got

  16. to leverage on the fact that the forty days is

  17. not just a day by day religious duty, because God

  18. has an appointed word for you. God has an appointed

  19. breakthrough for you. God wants to minister to your heart today.

  20. The spirit of God is calling us as a church

  21. to come back to Him. You know, fasting is a

  22. spiritual discipline. Every Christian mass practice. It is a spiritual discipline.

  23. If you're a Christian, you're a reliever in Christ. You

  24. just got to make fasting your lifestyle. Six verses sixteen

  25. or eighteen, it say it's moreover when you fast, Jesus

  26. is saying when you fast. Jesus didn say if you fast,

  27. Jesus ad and say when you like it, you fast.

  28. In fact, I believe in true the scripture, Jesus is

  29. expecting us to fast. Moreover, when you fast, do not

  30. be like the hypocrites with the said countenance, for they

  31. disfigure their faces that they may appear to men to

  32. be fasting. Shortly, I say to you, they have their reward,

  33. but you, when you fast, annoying your head and wash

  34. your face, so that you do not appear to men

  35. to be fasting. But to your father, who is in

  36. secret place. And your father, who sees in secret, will

  37. reward you openly. So fasting is always about your inner

  38. appearance more than your outer appearance. So what is fasting?

  39. You know that your scripture is written in two language,

  40. Hebrew and Greek. New Testament. Majority are in Greek. Old

  41. Testament majority is in Hebrew. So the Hebrew definition for

  42. fasting instant one to abstain from food for a specific purpose,

  43. for mourning, for repentance, or for seeking God. I know

  44. that in the modern day today many of us have

  45. taken on a form of modern fast. What are the

  46. modern fast? We are fast social media for forty days.

  47. We will fast sweets. If you like deserts, we will

  48. fast dessert. If we need to fast our Netflix, we

  49. need fast, our care drama, we need fast our online games.

  50. We will also call it a fast, which is technically

  51. is true. You're giving up something for a time, for

  52. a season. But if follow scripture, you're gonna learn to

  53. also set aside the fasting of food, to abstain from

  54. food for a certain time, or to abstain from seven

  55. food for a certain time with a purpose. Fasting without

  56. seeking God, fasting without a purpose, some you may know,

  57. is diet right. You can fast the meat, you can

  58. fast from a sun up to sundown. But if you

  59. don't seek God, if you don't change in the way

  60. you leave your lifestyle, nothing change. Fasting then becomes just

  61. a religion without the power to transform our life. True

  62. power fasting comes when we anchor it in God. When

  63. we anchor our fasting in seeking Him. So the Greek

  64. definition is voluntarily abstaining from food for spiritual purposes. In

  65. other words, fasting allow us to redirect our hunger to

  66. depend on God, because we have to come to a

  67. place where it is He who sustained and strengthened. Hence

  68. Jesus said, men shall not leave by braid alone, but

  69. by every word that proceeds from God. So fasting should

  70. be an outward expression of our sincere repentance before God

  71. by turning to him. In fact, in Old Testament, when

  72. you read, you realize that when the children of Israel

  73. was convicted of their saying, the Bible says that they

  74. will put on sackcloth, they will come to God in mourning.

  75. They will express it through fasting. Joe chapter two, verse

  76. twelve to thirteen says, Now therefore says the Lord, turn

  77. to me with all your heart. Say with me Church,

  78. all your heart. See it again, all your heart. It's

  79. not one percent of your heart, it's not ten percent

  80. of your heart. It's all of your heart. With what

  81. with fasting, with weeping, with mourning, meaning with brokenness, that

  82. we know that we are ranched in our sin, and

  83. we are so sorrowful that we have broken God's heart.

  84. We will mourn for it. So God says through the

  85. prophet Joel was thirteen. So ran your heart and not

  86. your comments, because outward experience, outward appearance is easy to mimic.

  87. You know back then and everybody they were very sorrowful.

  88. They'll tell of their clothes, But God is asking them.

  89. Tear your heart. Because you can tear your clothes outside,

  90. it doesn't mean inside your heart has been convicted fully.

  91. And the prophet says, return to the Lord your God,

  92. for he is gracious. How many of you say amen

  93. to that. Our God is gracious, Our God is merciful.

  94. Our God is slow to anger, and he is a

  95. God of great kindness, and he relents from doing harm.

  96. So this forty days. Come back to God as a church.

  97. Come back to God as his beloved child. Turn to

  98. Him with all your heart, returned to him. Return to God.

  99. Revelations too, Versus one to five. The Angel spoke to

  100. the Church of Ephesus. This thing says, he who holds

  101. the seven stars in the right hand, who walks in

  102. the midst of the seven golden landstand, I know your works,

  103. your labor your patients, and that you cannot bear those

  104. who are evil. And you have tested those who say

  105. they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars.

  106. And you have persevered and have patience, and have labored

  107. for my Name's sake and have not become weary. Sounds

  108. like a perfecttion church. It sounds like a church who

  109. stands for truth, stands for good works. Sounds like a

  110. church who knows how to overcome. Because the Angel testify

  111. that you have persevered and you have patient sounds like

  112. a church that is very God focused. Because you have

  113. labored for my name, says the Lord, and not become weary.

  114. Sounds like a very hard working church, a church that

  115. is diligent. But the Angel of the Lord says, nevertheless,

  116. I have this against you, that you have left your

  117. first left. It is a reminder for aur of us

  118. that our love for God must be number one. We

  119. cannot love the church more than we love Christ. We

  120. cannot love our ministry more than we love Christ. And

  121. it is given we cannot love the world more than

  122. we love Christ. Remember, therefore, from where you have fallen,

  123. repent and do the first works, or else I will

  124. come to you quickly and remove your landstamp from its

  125. place unless you repent today. The invitation that God is

  126. given to us is to come back to him in repentance,

  127. to come back to Him and allow him to examine

  128. our hearts. In areas where we have fallen, we should repent.

  129. In areas where we have strayed away from Him, we

  130. should come back to him. Repentance basically just mean a

  131. change of mind, a heart, and a direction return. Go

  132. back to where you were with God, restore what has

  133. been lost. If only each an erran of you can

  134. hear the heart bait of God, you'll be able to

  135. hear how much He longs to have your heart fully fully.

  136. Many of us struggle to hear from God. Many of

  137. us struggle to come back from God. Many of us

  138. struggle to have our consistency even in reading the word

  139. of God. And the true challenge to that is we

  140. have been having a form of perception of our relationship

  141. with God. We think we're okay, We think we are

  142. going through life, going through the motions. But how many

  143. of us would really take a pause and ask God

  144. really examine our heart. The scripture says where the Psalmist

  145. ask the Lord to search his heart. Because truth is,

  146. God wants us to overcome arias that we know we

  147. need to overcome, because it is that very area we

  148. need to overcome that is stopping us from experiencing Him

  149. in his fullness. Roman Street Journey three says, for all

  150. have seen and fall shot of the glory of God,

  151. all have sin. No one can say that he is

  152. not a sinner. Sin basically just means falling shot of

  153. God's standard, missing the mark. I will interpret it as

  154. anything that is on christ like is sin. But it's

  155. the beauty of the Gospel that in our sin God

  156. has already sent Jesus. There is hope, There is a

  157. way out of our sin. There is a way out

  158. to be delivered from darkness because God has already sent

  159. Jesus to redeemp us. So fasting often involve a form

  160. of breaking, a breaking of our heart, a breaking of

  161. our spirit is about turning to God in repentance that

  162. we are broken over our sin. In the Bible, when

  163. you read, you probably see different characters in the Bible

  164. who when they are convicted of their sin, they repented.

  165. But in my experience, even in my own life and

  166. speaking to people, around me for during one years now

  167. in the Lord. You know, sometimes we can repent because

  168. we fear the consequences. We fear the consequences, and therefore

  169. we repent. When you look at the life of Saul,

  170. he repented, but God was angry with him because he

  171. went against God's commandment willfully. The repentance that should come

  172. forth from our heart is that we should fear God

  173. and that we love him. How many of you have

  174. seen news or in your own life when people are

  175. caught chitting, either in their company and they begin to

  176. be very sorry. For example, they falcify accounts, they falcify reports,

  177. and then when they are caught only there they feel

  178. very sorry. So when they are not caught, they don't

  179. feel sorry, is it? And then they'll say, oill, I'll

  180. never do it again. Give me a chance, I'll never

  181. do it again because they fear the consequences. More and

  182. more people are living a promiscurst lifestyle. I'm in a

  183. campus ministry. I know you know that recently the Ministry

  184. of Health, not ministry of a ministry of higher education,

  185. gave us statistics. I can't remember the statistics, but the

  186. number of new HIVY patients among university students is on

  187. the rise. It's scary. It's very scary. So when again,

  188. in a relationship they cross their boundaries, we got to

  189. understand that with every scene there is a consequence. But

  190. we cannot offer us a spirit where we repent because

  191. we fear the consequence rather than we fear God himself.

  192. So fear God. When was the last time we were

  193. broken because of our sin? How do we express our brokenness?

  194. The disciples came to Jesus and asked Jesus Lord pictures

  195. to pray. Many of you would be familiar with the

  196. Lord's prayer. Our Father is in heaven. Hello, it be

  197. dy named the Kingdom Come. That will be done on

  198. earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day

  199. our daily pray, and what forgive us of our trespass

  200. as we forget if those who have trespassed against us.

  201. In other words, forgive us of our sins. Remember it

  202. is a daily prayer. Give us this day our daily break,

  203. and forgive us. So it tells me that repentance should

  204. be a daily thing, that every day we come to

  205. God asking his forgiveness, and that every day we should

  206. bear the fruit of repentance. So what is the fruit

  207. of repentance. The fraud of repentance to me is basically

  208. to be better, to conform to whatever the word of

  209. God encourages us to have. So remember, God is gracious,

  210. God is merciful, but we must do our part to

  211. come to him, to return to him. You know what's

  212. the meaning of return? Right? Return? Basically me. You know

  213. you have a place to belong. That's why you return.

  214. So you belong to God, you belong to the family

  215. of God, you belong to the Father's love. So return.

  216. In First John one five to nine says, this is

  217. a message which we have heard from Him and declare

  218. to you that God is light and in him is

  219. no darkness. If we say that we have fellowship with

  220. Him and walk in darkness, we lie and we do

  221. not practice the truth. Holiness and sin cannot coexist. Light

  222. and thatness cannot co exists. You have to understand that

  223. if we say that we have fellowship with God and

  224. walk in darkness, we lie. This forty days asks God

  225. to expose any area of darkness in your life. Because

  226. I'm saying it before, I'm saying it again. There God

  227. will expose. And when God exposed it, will means one thing.

  228. He's gracious to you, so that while you're here you

  229. have time to repent. You have time to come back

  230. to him, because the day will come where all of

  231. us will be standing in front of the throne of

  232. judgment that will be tru late. So as a holy spirit,

  233. search our hearts. But if we walk in the light

  234. as He is in the light, we have fellowship with

  235. one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son,

  236. cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we

  237. have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is

  238. not in us. If we confess our sins, he is

  239. faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to

  240. cleanse us from all unrighteousness. So in this fourwards us

  241. you're able to see that we should not lie to ourselves,

  242. the biggest deception that the enemy will always throw to us.

  243. As Christian is dead. We think we're okay, but we

  244. are not okay. We think we have a right relationship

  245. with God, but we are not having the right relationship

  246. with God. God. Your heart with the Lord God, it

  247. guard it with all your heart. Johnny thirty one thirty two.

  248. Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed him. If

  249. you abide in my word, you are my disciples indeed,

  250. and you will know the truth, and the truth shall

  251. make you free. You know in summer one nine he says,

  252. the Sammy says, how can a young man keep his

  253. way pure by hiding your word in my heart? By

  254. keeping your word in my heart that I might not

  255. see against you, Jesus says, if you abide in my word,

  256. you are my disciples. Indeed. So God did not leave you.

  257. God did not left you alone. He has given you

  258. his word. If only we are as diligently reading his

  259. word compared to other areas, perhaps we will be able

  260. to have that life where you will abide in God's

  261. truth better. Your faith and your relationship with crist cannot

  262. be built based on experiences only. It cannot just be

  263. built on a YouTube message or Spotify message. Faith and

  264. a relationship with God cannot be built only on a Sunday.

  265. It must be built every day. And that is true.

  266. Hearing his voice through his word, this forty days set

  267. aside time, it is half an hour set aside, that

  268. half an hour to come back to seek him. Allow

  269. his word to renew your mind. Allow his word to

  270. cleanse your mind. Allow his word to cleanse your spirit.

  271. Because the world we live in is highly corrupted. Everything

  272. you see on social media, everything you see on movies,

  273. everything you see on shopping malls, every time you go out.

  274. When you get exposed to the world, it corrupts your mind.

  275. But if you don't filter it in the lens of God,

  276. if you don't filter it according to the word of God,

  277. you will be corrupted. Remember, Jesus says, we are in

  278. the world, but we are not off the world. We

  279. belong to the Kingdom of God. But we must choose

  280. whether we want to be in the light or we

  281. want to be in darkness. To know the truth is

  282. to know and abide in his word. Many of you

  283. were know King David. Scripture says that he is a

  284. man after God's own heart. We remember David for slaying Goliath,

  285. remember David for his three hundred strong men, and some

  286. will remember David for the scene of a doubt tree

  287. and a scene of murder that he committed. When I

  288. look at scriptures, when I read the timeline of how

  289. David fell, the child was born, so probably it would

  290. take nine months or ten months, or probably a year,

  291. although there's no time there, but you think about it

  292. from a point of conception in Sceine to the point

  293. where Naden confronted him, there was a probably a period

  294. of one year. How did David left live his life

  295. during that time? Sometimes we think we can hide from God.

  296. Sometimes we are very good in making sure people around

  297. us think that we're okay. But when God sent Nathan

  298. to speak to David confronted David, God was being gracious

  299. to David to the point upon hearing the word from

  300. Naden he had time to repent and some fifty one

  301. to me is one of the most poignant, one of

  302. the most emotional sums that David have crafted out of

  303. his brokenness. He says, the sacrifices of God are a

  304. broken spirit and a broken and a contract heart. Died,

  305. O God, you will not despise what was David broken about.

  306. He was broken about his own sin. He was broken

  307. about that relationship with God that was affected because of

  308. his sin. That's why, in the same sum he says,

  309. do not take away your Holy Spirit from me. That

  310. as Christians, we must understand that the spirit of the

  311. Living God lives in us. We are the temple of

  312. the Holy Spirit. Scripture says that we should not quench

  313. the spirit. So that's what brokenness does. We come to

  314. realization that we have quenched the spirit of God, we

  315. have grieved the spirit of God. And if our heart

  316. is numb to this, we are in a danger of

  317. stray further away from God. Because before repentance is conviction

  318. of sin, and conviction of sin can only come from

  319. the Holy Spirit. You can have counseling sessions, you can

  320. speak to your leaders. Your leaders can speak to you,

  321. but nothing can change your heart except through the conviction

  322. of the Holy Spirit John sixteen eight. And when he

  323. has come, he will come withct the world of sin

  324. and of righteousness and of judgment. Be open to the

  325. Holy Spirit. He's in you. Firsting builds up, builds us

  326. up spiritually, and grows our intimacy with God. Galatians Chapter five,

  327. Verses sixteen or twenty four. I say that walk in

  328. the spirit, and you shall not fulfill the last of

  329. the flesh. Walk in the spirit, walk with the Holy Spirit.

  330. Here is your helper, He is your guide. For the

  331. flesh lust against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh.

  332. And these are contrary to one another. So that you

  333. do not do the things that you wish. But if

  334. you are led by the spirit, you are not under

  335. the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident,

  336. meaning the works of the flesh can be seen, which

  337. are adult tree, phnication and cleanness, luteness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contessions, jealousies,

  338. outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissension, heresies, envies, murders, drunkenness, revelies,

  339. and the like of which I tell you beforehand. Just

  340. I told you in the time past that those who

  341. practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

  342. Jesus says, a doubt tree begins with a heart. Jesus says,

  343. if you hate your brother, that is likened to murder.

  344. We're living in a world where there is a moral decay.

  345. They're no longer black and white. Some things are gray.

  346. Believe a world where it's getting darker. A couple of

  347. weeks ago, I share with you how in a coplay

  348. concert things were exposed through a simple camera. I share

  349. with you that a couple of weeks ago, and I

  350. say that God will always judge his people. First judgment

  351. begins in the House of God. Why because his people

  352. are expected to know his commandment. These people I expect

  353. to know his word. Nobody, when you stand before God,

  354. can you say I didn't know? Sorcery is a sin

  355. I didn't know. Believing in astrology, doing woodoo or celtic

  356. is a scein nobody. If you're a Christian, there's no

  357. excuses for you not to know. Nobody can stand before

  358. God if you're a Christian to say that I didn't know.

  359. Revelies and let's choose another one. Jealousies are sin. You

  360. are expected to know. You should know, you must know

  361. because all these scenes basically speaks of one thing, self

  362. senteredness and self sensed. Nurse is a pride where these scenes,

  363. when people live in these scenes, is as dough because

  364. they put as selfish ambitions. Dissensions is like you're making

  365. you're breaking unity. Heresies are false teachings, contentions. You like

  366. to look for. Fault hatred. You guys know that ideal

  367. treat You guys know that anything that is above God.

  368. Luteness and uncleanness are basically a form of sexual perversion.

  369. Adult tree. You guys know that fhnications are basically sex

  370. before marriage and all all these things. If we don't repent,

  371. we will not inherit the kingdom of God. You know,

  372. I've been working with people who are often bound with

  373. pornographic and I know how it feels to live in darkness.

  374. And I know the courage people will have when it

  375. come up to me and say that I'm bound. I

  376. need a way out, because me too. When I was

  377. twenty years old, I woke up to my churchy old there,

  378. I say that I need help. I knew what shame is.

  379. I knew what condemnation is. When we have done things

  380. that we know is wrong. How sometimes we feel condemned,

  381. How sometimes we feel we are unworthy of God's love,

  382. How sometimes we feel we are unclean. The enemy will

  383. always come to still kill and destroy, and often he

  384. wants to kill off your identity in God. But the

  385. scripture says, as many who believe in Jesus, he have

  386. given us rights to be the children of God. There

  387. is hope. God doesn't condemn us. God wants us to come.

  388. God wants us to deal with a scene in our hearts.

  389. If there's a root of bitterness in our hearts that

  390. has become poisoned, if there's a root of unforgiveness in

  391. our hearts that have become poisoned. Deal with it, deal

  392. with it. Different people are tempted differently. Different people have

  393. different form of sin. It doesn't mean that if I

  394. engage in let's say, idolatry, then my scene is lesser

  395. than those who engage in drunkenness, for example. Make no mistake,

  396. a scene is a sin. There's no big scein, there's

  397. no small scein. Scein is sein. And sometimes we don't

  398. deal with sin because we say, oh, it's just a lass,

  399. it's just an envy, it's not murder. Therefore, you keep

  400. on living a life where you're having sexual fantasy. You're

  401. living a life where you have of uncleanness, and you

  402. are bound thinking that you're not bound. Why because we

  403. have been comparing our sin to the scene of others,

  404. thinking that our sin is smaller. Scripture is clear, as

  405. we read earlier in the First John, we lied to

  406. ourselves and the truth is not in us. So fasting

  407. to me is starving the flesh. We're going to staff

  408. our flesh because the flesh always wrestle against the spirit.

  409. If you don't staff your flesh your flesh is going

  410. to direct your appetite. So we're going to direct our

  411. appetite towards spiritual things, towards the things of God, because

  412. fasting also expresses our dependence on God and sharpening our focus.

  413. In other words, we have to deny our flos and

  414. discipline our spirit. The disciplining of the spirit part is

  415. a very hard thing to do, yet it is necessary.

  416. In Galatians five twenty two, he says, here, but the

  417. fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, long suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness,

  418. self control. Against such there is no law. And those

  419. who are Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions

  420. and desire. If we live in the spirit, let us

  421. also walk in the spirit. Scriptures for the says that

  422. as many are led by the spirit of God. In

  423. the Book of Romans, these are the sons of God,

  424. these are the daughters of God. So I'm just reading

  425. the scripture. It's amazing how God through Paul started off

  426. with the work of the flesh, and then you end

  427. it with the fur of the spirit. So, in other words,

  428. the fruit of the spirit will help you to overcome sin.

  429. When you have self control, you will have a better

  430. chance to stand against temptation. When you have love, your

  431. love for God, your love for people around you, you

  432. have a better chance to stand against temptation. When you

  433. have peace, you have a better chance to stand against temptation.

  434. James One verses twelve to sixteen. Blessed is the man

  435. who endures temptation. And during temptation, I can tell you

  436. is one of the hardest. It's the hardest. God knows

  437. we are flesh and blood. God knows we are weak.

  438. That's why he has given us his grace. That's why

  439. he has given us his see For when he has

  440. been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which

  441. the Lord has promised to those who love him. So

  442. you've loved the Lord, You've got to endure. Let no

  443. one say when he is tempted, I'm tempted by God.

  444. Here it is. Let no one who is tempted says

  445. I'm tempted by God. Right, nobody says, but Lord, you

  446. place the cash counter right in front of me. When

  447. there's no one m God will not tempt his people,

  448. for God cannot be tempted by evil. Not does he

  449. himself tempt anyone, but each one is tempted when he

  450. is drawn away by his own desires and anteas damn

  451. and desire has conceived give birth to Sin. See as

  452. I mentioned earlier, David was very last ful because he

  453. was driven by lust. It end up in murder as well,

  454. because that scene that desire has conceived, it gives birth

  455. to Sein and seen when it's full grown, bring forth death.

  456. The death here doesn't mean a physical form of death.

  457. It just means towards the things of God. You are dead.

  458. You cannot hear God. You don't have appetite for God

  459. because Sein have taken your appetite. Do not be deceived

  460. My delivered bedroom. So strong spiritual discipline like fasting, can

  461. subject your flesh to greater discipline. We need spiritual muscle, friends,

  462. We need spiritual muscles of you know King Solomon first,

  463. King street Tree, and Solomon loved the Lord walking in

  464. the statues of his father. David accept that he sacrifices

  465. and burned in says at high places, meaning he was

  466. also worshiping other gods. God's commandment or Israelites were also

  467. very clear they should not take in foreign wives. Yet

  468. Solomon have thousands of wife and even more Cockumbines. The

  469. greatest deceit, The greatest deception I can tell myself is

  470. that I love the Lord, yet I live in sin.

  471. I love the Lord, yet there accepts in my life.

  472. Matthew seven twenty three. Not everyone who says to me,

  473. Lord Lord, shall enter the kingdom of Heaven, but he

  474. who does the vial of my Father in heaven. The

  475. vial of God is already clear in the Word of God.

  476. Many will say to me in that day, Lord Lord,

  477. have we not prophesied in your name, cast out demons

  478. in your name, and done many wonders in your name?

  479. And then I will declare to them, I never knew you.

  480. Depart from me, you who practice lawliness sae. Christ came

  481. to give us salvation. But while we are on earth,

  482. we're expected to walk with the spirit, crucify the desires

  483. of the flesh and your temptation, and overcome, because only

  484. by enduring, by overcoming, then we will have the crown

  485. of life, as we have read in a book of James.

  486. So believing in Christ is hard work. Actually, anyone who

  487. comes to you and say that believe in Jesus, you

  488. don't have to transform, just believe in him. You are saved.

  489. You've got to think very, very hard. Is that what

  490. Christ required of you? Yeah, deal with the accepts in

  491. our life. First thing gives you the spiritual strength to

  492. overcome Mary you sixteen twenty four. Then Jesus said to

  493. his disciples, if anyone desires to come after me, let

  494. him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.

  495. So by firsting, you're denying your flesh. By firsting, you

  496. are tuning in to God. It's difficult becoming a Christian. Recently,

  497. I had a conversation with my colleague who is also

  498. a Christian. There's a form of injustice that this person

  499. went through, and we were just talking. Last year, I

  500. went through probably a similar episode. I found myself to

  501. be bitter, I found myself to be poisoned, I found

  502. myself language were changing a bit. And my colleague just

  503. asked me, how did you overcome? I say, I'm still managing.

  504. I'm still trying my best to give certain individuals a

  505. very healthy mindset. But it's difficult. It's difficult. It's difficult

  506. when you felt trespassed. Is difficult, when you felt that

  507. you're being mistreated. It's difficult when you felt that you're

  508. being parked in a cold storage. It's difficult. Okay. For context,

  509. I don't work in church. In case you're wondering, I

  510. work outside of church something, maybe a church your face

  511. and say I don't know. Oops, God got right. Dealing

  512. with people can be complex. I remember telling my college

  513. that gott to crucify the flesh because we represent Christ,

  514. we're an ambassador of Christ. We got to deny fighting back.

  515. There's a time to fight, there's a time to not fight.

  516. As they says, there's a time for everything. But suffice

  517. to say, following Jesus requires heart work. Heart work, sext

  518. me lying it's time to look at our heart again.

  519. It's time to examine our heart. Bring to God's light

  520. because fasting also invites God's presence to come in the

  521. midst of your brokenness. God will never leave you alone,

  522. but we must come back. Scripture says that draw near

  523. to God, and He will draw near to you. The

  524. heart has to be guarded. Look five thirty three to

  525. thirty four. Then they say to him, Jesus, why do

  526. the disciples of John fast often and make prayers, and

  527. likewise those of the Pharisees, But yours eat and drink,

  528. and he said to them, can you make the friends

  529. of the bright group fast while the bridegroom is with them?

  530. But the days will come when the bridegroom will take away,

  531. will be taken away from them. Then they were fast

  532. in those days. So Jesus was his was with his

  533. disciple that represents his presence, and when Jesus was taken away,

  534. the disciples needed to fast. I interpret it as we

  535. fast because we want the presence of the Brightgroom to

  536. come back. We fast because we yearn for God's presence.

  537. We yearn for God's companionship. We yearn for God's fellowship.

  538. God desire to hear the wises of his children. God

  539. desires his people to come to him. So in the breaking,

  540. our heart gets softened. In the breaking, our heart gets molded.

  541. Our heart must always remain soft before God. Josh can come.

  542. If our heart is hardened before God, nothing changes, nothing

  543. nothing changes. So fasting helps grow our intimacy with God,

  544. and fasting will help us to discern his voice. So

  545. as you stand, I'm going to close in a song

  546. where you are, why don't you build an altar before

  547. the Lord? And there's really no judgment around one another

  548. here except being in the light of Christ and ask

  549. God to examine our hearts. Dosamin area is where you

  550. want God to help you to overcome. Are there any

  551. areas in our life that we want to get right

  552. with God? Because we can only leave the right life

  553. if our relationship with God is right as the Holy

  554. Spirit such our hearts. He's in you, he is your helper,

  555. he will guide you, he will lead you. Is a

  556. heart called towards God? Or is our heart on fire

  557. for him? Is a heart convicted of sin? Or is

  558. our heart numb to sin? It's a heart hungry for God?

  559. Or is a heart fool with appetite for the world. Remember,

  560. Jesus came to redeem us with his life. Jesus came

  561. shed his blood for you and me, so that with

  562. his blood, the Bible says, our sin has been washed away.

  563. That through his broken body, our sins are forgiven. To

  564. imagine the Son of God shedding his blood for you

  565. and me because He knows we ourselves by our own works,

  566. we have no hope. So we have decided to pave

  567. away for us show us the way to God. That

  568. while we were seeing as God demonstrated his love for

  569. us by giving us Jesus. So today as we stand,

  570. we do not stand them stand in the righteousness of Jesus.

  571. We stand because the work of Jesus as the lowdest

  572. to come into God's presence. Ask the Holy Spirit? Are

  573. there accepts in our life? Solomon was a successful man.

  574. The scripture says that Solomon had two dreams mighty encounter

  575. with God, yet he didn't deal with his accepts. Are

  576. the accepts in your life that has been inhibiting you

  577. from experiencing God in his fullness? Sometimes you want to

  578. progress in life, but you felt that there's always that limitation.

  579. Sometimes you wonder how come your breakthrough is not near?

  580. Not near yet? Are there accepts in your life that

  581. you need to deal with? Are there something that you

  582. want to come before God and ask him to help you?

  583. The scripture says that no temptation has overtaken us, except

  584. which is common to men. But even at a point

  585. when we are being tempted, God is faithful. He will

  586. show us a way out.

  587. We hope you've been blessed by this message. For more

  588. information on our church, please visit as Church Org. We

  589. are also active on Facebook and Instagram. We're believing that

  590. this week is going to be a good week. I

  591. hit for you, God bless