Voice of the Nazarene 7-28-24

Coming to you from North Central Ohio. We share with you the voice of the Nazarene a week by week, venture into the Word of God sponsored by the buchars Ohio Church of the Nazarene. We join our Pastor Reverend Ray LaSalle and the voice of the Nazarene.

Verse 23 glorify God in your bodies, in your bodies. Now he's saying that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Of course, to have a body, you have to have a birth, July the 27th 1900 and none of your Business.

Old doc Baker separated my little body from my mother, that's enough to make a boy cry, but then he held me upside down and slapped me in my equator, and I breathed my first breath of air. I had a little body.

When God put Adam on planet earth, he never made him to be a sharecropper, he was not a welfare recipient. He was the monarch of this planet. It was God's vice regent ruler. Fact of the matter, there's a couple scriptures and you need to get a hold of this in your mind it'll change your thinking, hopefully, on a few things. There in Psalm 115, verse 16, the heavens, even the heavens are the Lord's, now catch this, but the Earth hath he given to the children of men.

Psalms 115:16

God gave us this Earth. He gave us this Earth. We're made in the image of God. God made us, and he's talking about our bodies, and he put us here, and we get so hung up we're hugging trees, we're fussing over whether the Earth's going to survive, and everybody's talking about everything's depleting and on and on and on a lot of crazy stuff. You get on the internet and really study you'll find that this Earth is reproducing oil and reproducing gas, and as far as pollutions and all of that, the waters of our streams and our swamps and our ocean literally is cleansing itself.

Things are not near as bad as you think it is. God's put us here, and he said that he's given to us the Earth. And then

26 God said, Let us make men in our image, after our likeness, and let us let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the fowl of the air, over the cattle, over all the earth, over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. In verse 28 Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the

and have dominion over it. God gave man authority because he's got God's nature. And what gave Adam his authority was because he was born here. He was homegrown. He had rights. I don't know if you've studied the Constitution, but you can't be President of the United States unless you're a natural born citizen. Now Jesus tells us in his teachings in John chapter 10, that the devil is a thief and a robber.

John 10 · chapter mention

You know why? Because robbers make illegal entry. Watch this.

Satan showed up in the garden, and when he did, he was a trespasser, he was an intruder, he was an alien. He was an angel species not born on this planet.

And although he had power, he had no authority to exercise that power, but Adam had authority and power, and how was he going to release that authority and that power by words, made in the image of God.

How does God release his authority and his power? By words. And here comes the devil, and the devil cloaks himself in the form of a serpent. Why would he do that? Because he has nobody, and having nobody, he cannot speak into our realm because he's spirit. Say what you want to fall in spirit, evil spirit but at one time had been an angel in heaven, but he's lost that state, and he's lost that level, but he's on Earth, but still in spirit, he has to find a body, and he uses a serpent. No wonder the serpent was cursed. God said, from that point on, it'll crawl on the ground, it'll lap up the dust.

Fact of the matter, the devil doesn't even have a leg to stand on, Now. You see, he's been defeated. Zoom. Do I need to repeat that? And so the devil uses the body of this serpent to get to our level. And he uses a serpent which was illegal. Adam should have rebuked the devil, but he didn't. And the devil was not born here, therefore he's illegal. I want you to watch this real quick, like Jesus NOW comes to the planet, and hell is scratching its head, and Hell's trying to figure out what in the world's going on. There's a bunch of angels over here, a big choir, and they're practicing up, and they're saying, Peace on Earth. And something's happening near Jerusalem, and what in the world is going on. And suddenly those angels say unto you, is born this day, born. Watch that.

Now. Here's God, He's the judge of all the Earth and Satan's smart enough to know that God has to play by his own laws. He has to play by his own rules.

God could not violate his own declaration by just coming in and saving Adam. I mean, he can't step in on this economy, because God is Spirit. So God's saying, Well, you're right, and I need to do this legally. So what happens here? I need to find a little Jewish handmaiden, a virgin, because I've got to find a body. If I'm going to come into the same level, I have to have a body. And so Hey, little lady, can I borrow your body for about nine months? Just need it for nine months, God had to search for a body to provide our salvation. Let me read something to you. It's Hebrews 10:4, for it's not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins.

Hebrews 10:4

Wherefore, when he cometh into the world, he say, a sacrifice and offerings thou hast not, or wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me. God had to step in the flesh. God had to come. God had to put on a body to approach us. And not only is your initial salvation depended upon God finding himself a body, but your eternal salvation also depends whether or not you will give your body back to him to use. And he said, but a body has thou prepared me. Now listen, the Holy Ghost overshadows this little virgin, and if you're not clear on the virgin birth, you'll never get cleaned up and cleared up on the new birth. And it's all a miracle, and it has to do with the human will. She said, Thy will be done. I'll be your handmaiden. Your will be done. And it's always about our will. The tragedy of unconditional security is that we say that we get saved by will and if we're saved by will, then we lose our will, and that's just not so. You have enough will, you'll always have will.

You can walk off from God when you want to. You can say, I'm not going to pray anymore, I'm not going to attend church, I'm going to defy God. That's tragedy. And so here's this little Hebrew girl who gives a cent to God. She's pregnant now.

She's waddling around. I mean, she's great with child, and she's got a miracle going on inside of her. Let me tell you something. When you've got a miracle going on inside of you, you're going to walk differently. And when you got a miracle going on inside of you, you're going to be careful what you ingest. I mean, you're not going to be using drugs and nicotine and boozing up. I mean, you got a miracle going on, you got a miracle going on, you're going to be listening to the doctor's orders, aren't you? And so she had a miracle, and this little Hebrew girl is going to have a baby. Now you talk about a birthday party. Here's this little baby laying over there in the straw, and God is not going to allow this miracle to go unnoticed. He hangs a star 1500 miles away into the sky, and wise men of the Orient look up as they see the star and it started moving, and they said, We better, better get caught up here we'll never make it in time. Two years later, they show up, but a miracle is happening right here, and God sends angels. He dispatches millions of angels, and they gather behind the clouds, and they're practicing up, and the orchestra of Heaven is tuning their instruments, and all the angels have been practicing for 4000 years one line of a song. Be a pretty good song, wouldn't it?

With angels all getting practice up, and the choir director of Heaven is getting all of them keyed in, and he's looking back over his shoulder and said, as has Mary had the baby head, and Lucifer had to be losing his mind. He'd once been the choir director. He'd been in charge of all of the music, and now music is happening, and he knows he's in trouble. And they said the baby's born, and they begin to sing Glory to God in the highest peace on earth, good will toward men, for under you is born under you, is born under you is born this day in the city of David, a Savior, which is Christ, the King. Suddenly, you and I have got legal rights to redemption, because God has incarnated Himself in a legal body. And the

26, For as the Father hath life in himself, so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself, and hath given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the son of man. You got to get this. If you get a block on this in your brain, you're going to miss what's really going on in the world around us. Notice Jesus said, The Father hath given me authority because I am the Son of Man. He'd put on a body. You realize that God, when he walked in the man, Christ, Jesus, did not operate on Earth as deity, but as man. You say that was Jesus, ya and you got Jesus in you. And you need to

38, how that God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power, who went around doing good, healing all that were oppressed to the devil, for God was with Him. God anointed the man, Christ, Jesus. Do you realize that in the flesh, he needed baptized, too? Do you realize that in the flesh, he needed to be filled with the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit like a dove descended on him?

You see, he was not deity in disguise he was an anointed man, and the man anointed with the same Holy Ghost that you have.

That's why he said, what I do, you shall do it, you'll do it greater. Now, not kidding. Watch this. He walks in, in Luke, chapter four, verse 32 into the synagogue. And the Bible said there was a man there with an unclean spirit. In other words, he was demon possessed. And the man, are these spirits speaking through the man said, What are we to do with you? We know who you are. You're the Holy One of God. Now watch this. The devil was saying to Jesus, in essence, what are you doing here? I know why I'm here, I'm a rebel, I'm a trespasser, I'm an intruder, I'm just simply a jerk. I have no rights to be here, but I'm here because I'm trying to upset things. But what are you doing here? And Jesus merely smiled and said, I was born here. I've got a body. I'm going to take this body to the cross. This body is going to lay down its light. I want to tell you something. He had the authority, they said in that little synagogue meeting, he has the authority and the power that he commanded the unclean spirits as they come out. Now, when man sinned, he lost two things. He lost his authority, and he was born here, and he lost his power, which we have the nature of God, and that's why we need to be born again. We need to be born from above, so we have the power to live victoriously right here, I want to look at the body for a moment. Do you know what Jesus was doing when he came to Earth? The main thing he was doing, I believe that he was the royal real estate agent. I believe he was looking for, like a house hunter from heaven. He was looking he was checking out the real estate. He wasn't just looking for sick people and preaching little neat sermons about mustard seeds and fishing nets. No, I believe he was looking for bodies. He was looking for containers. He was looking for Earthly jars. And he was looking for someone that could be filled with His Spirit.

And we have this treasure in earthen vessels. We're God's house. Fact of the matter, we're His Holy of Holies. You know what he called it in First Corinthians six, he said, know ye not that your bodies is the temple. And that word is vacuous and that word vacuous simply means Holy of Holies. Know ye not that your body is the Holy of Holies for the presence of God. Now, when somebody comes along and they have this little cliche. It doesn't matter about the body and how it looks. Hey, it's God's house. Don't desecrate the body that God wants to dwell in through His Holy Spirit. It's God's house, and our body is the battleground. Why do you think Satan hates our bodies so much?

Just thinking with you, why do you think he hates it? Why did Satan do his very best to destroy Moses? Because God knew that he had to have a body in order to save 3 million of his Jewish slaves. And Jochebed, the mother of Moses took that little baby, that body, and put it in a little crib, a little basket, placed it out there in the Nile.

The Pharaoh had said that all the male babies are to be thrown into the Nile River, she put him in the Nile, but put him in a basket. God needed a redeemer.

Why do you think that Potiphar's wife tried to seduce Joseph from his integrity, because God needed a redeemer for Jacob and all of the chosen people to have a place to live. And so down there in Egypt, he allowed Joseph become the second in command for seven years, put up food and for the next seven years during a famine so that he could save his people. Why do you think that Saul hated David so much that he was continually trying to kill him? Because it was in the body of David he was to be the greatest king ever.

Let me ask you another question.

Why do you think our flesh is under so much temptation? Why does the devil just bug us and battle us? We're fought in every form and from every angle of attack. There's the lust of the flesh, there's the lust of the eye, there's all kinds of things calling for our attention, whatever it might be, and it's our appetite. You know why?

Because the devil can't get to the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit put him out of heaven. He's no match for the Holy Spirit. He has no power. But if he could get to the body of man, we're to be the habitation for the Holy Spirit to dwell in. He wants to rule our bodies. He wants to control us. He wants to get us into bondage. And he said, Know you not that the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. No wonder He said, present your bodies a living sacrifice. Now watch this, when Jesus was born, what did the devil do? He tried everything he could to kill the body. Fact of the matter, Joseph got his wife and a little baby, and they fled to Egypt till after Herod had died. Devil was saying, I've got to get rid of that body. When Jesus was in the wilderness, here came the devil, and he showed Him all the kingdoms of the world. And it was kind of a panoramic overview of some kind.

And he said, If you bow down to me, I'll give you all of these, all these kingdoms of the world.

Now, either Jesus was not God in the flesh, or Jesus did not know that the devil was lying, or the devil was telling the truth, because the devil received authority for those kingdoms when Adam committed high treason back there in the garden. So Adam transferred the authority of dominion to the devil and lost his power with God's nature through transgression. Now the devil shows Jesus all of these kingdoms, because he knew that in the body of Jesus was the power that would finish him. But he couldn't get Jesus to kneel down, could he? If you'll bow down and worship me I'll give you all of this. And Jesus simply answered Satan. It's written, Thou shalt worship God, the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve. And for the next three years, Satan battled Jesus in every way, tried to stone him, tried to kill him, tried to insult him, tried to depress him. Jesus said, Well, you also go away and don't think that you're on virgin territory when you're under attack and you're depressed. Jesus went through the same thing. The Bible said that he was tempted in all points, like as we are.

Jesus felt pain in the human flesh, the human side of Christ would die on a cross. The only difference between you and I, basically, was the fact that Jesus was sinless, born of a virgin, had no Earthly father, and so the nature of sin, the adamic nature, was not passed on to him, but he would live on Earth in the human anointed of God and would lay that body down. He healed everybody that walked in shoe leather that he came into contact with nearly and yet, when it was all over, only had 120 followers. He fed about 25,000 people with a little boy's lunch. But when he counted his Sunday school roles, he only had about 120 and then they crucified Him. And hell begin to whoop it up and said, We got rid of the body. We're going to have a party. We bumped off Jesus. We've got rid of the body. But 72 hours later, Jesus stepped out of that grave victoriously, and he said, Give me the keys. Give me the keys.

That same Jesus is in you, that same Holy Spirit is in you, that same resurrected overcoming power is in us. All he wants is our body. He's just simply saying, I've got to have some bodies that's what he's talking about. Now, did you know that when Jesus was resurrected, after his resurrection, he never performed another miracle? Now, we know that in the resurrected body, he walked through a wall, but I'm talking about a miracle for humanity. Not another person was healed that was sick, not another devil was cast out, not a dead person raised from the dead. And there's a reason.

What's the reason? Because he was disqualified now he's not in an Earthly body, he's in a resurrected body, and so Hell's happy. He blasts off from Mount Olivet. They couldn't figure out what was up. You see, he had their keys to the kingdom in his girdle. Did you know your father has the keys over death, hell and the grave? Devil really doesn't have any keys to keep you in bondage you just want to live in that bondage. He can't use pornography, he can't use drugs or anything else. If you want to be free, God has all authority, and God has all power, and he has the keys to set you free. Now we've heard a lot of sermons about Joseph and the borrowed tomb, have we not?

We've heard all kinds of ways to look at it, and I wondered why Jesus died myself. I wonder why did he die without any insurance. He had to put his own mother in John's house. They buried him in a borrowed tomb.

But listen, Jesus was a Jew, and Jewish people have really been blessed of God to be great businessmen, haven't they? So it makes a lot of sense. He thought, Why would I want to buy a tomb when I'm only going to use it for three days? I'll just, I'll borrow the tomb. But he realized that he bought you, he borrowed a tomb, but he bought you. Why? Because he wants to live in you forever and ever and ever. He bought the church, but he borrowed a tomb.

He only needed it for three days, but he wants your body forever. And do you realize that one day he's coming back for your body? Let me read to you Romans, chapter eight, verse 11, But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.

Now Jesus ascends to heaven, hells in glee. Jesus has left the atmosphere. His body is gone. We got rid of Jesus, but wait. 10 days later, in an upstairs room, 120 people were filled with the Holy Spirit.

Suddenly, we got 120 Jesus's.

And by the time they got out on the street, begin to preach.

Before the day was over, there's 3000 little Jesus, and within six months, more than half of Jerusalem was converted, and people were filled with the Holy Spirit, and all of them doing what Jesus had been doing, sharing and spreading the gospel. If there's any reason why I'm giving my body to him because I want the authority over the devil when he comes around and said, If thou be The Son of God. That's what he said to Jesus. I've had him many times say, Ray LaSalle, who in the world do you think you are?

You can't live good enough, and you can't make it, and you don't have it, and on and on. And I can look him in the eye and say, there's no if I'm the son of God, I am. I have that authority because he's changed my life.

Amen. And it gives me the power to become a living witness.

Let's talk about the stowing for a moment. He said here that we're to present our bodies a living sacrifice, present your bodies. That's what he's asking for. I mean, we live in all of these struggles, and our mind does tricks on us and the flesh is saying this and on and on and on. Why don't we just surrender ourself totally and completely and entirely mind, body, soul and spirit. God, I give it all to you. You just take charge.

You fill me to overflowing. Now back to Jesus. He didn't do any more miracles after the resurrection, but in that upper room, he began to do through them what he had been doing while He was on Earth. The oil began to flow. The Holy Spirit came and fueled them to overflowing, and that's why the Bible said we have this treasure in earthen vessels, human bodies. You're either a container for trash or for treasure. And when it comes to the body, it's of a little value, but what it contains, who's on the inside gives it any value. And if you think the Holy Ghost is going to preach the gospel to the world, you're nuttier than a fruitcake. If you think that God's going to dispatch some angels to share the gospel, I don't know what you're on, but it's not helping you any. God has given us the responsibility, and he calls it the body of Christ. It's the church. And don't think the value of the body is unimportant, because if he's coming back for it, that means one day he's going to call on those bodies up out of the grave like he did Lazarus. When they hear the names. We're to hear names like Millie Jordan and Ed Dillinger, and we can just go on and on of people that we have laid to rest. He's coming back, and the body and the spirit will be reunited together, and so shall we ever be with him. I go back to that text for a moment.

I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God that you present your bodies.

Wouldn't it be something of every one of us said, God, you could just have all of me, just all of me. You need a place to inhabit. You need a place to dwell on Earth, and you don't have a body, but if I give you my body, you can dwell in me.

And if all of us, can you imagine a whole bunch of us, little Jesus, going around full of the Spirit, and he's taken the curse words out of our mouth, he's taken the evil thoughts out of our mind. He so turned us around that we live like Christ on Earth, and we're a living example and witness to who Jesus is and what God is all about in the heavens. And all he's asking for is your reasonable service. I give you that body, would you give me your body back to me? And I'm saying, for this boy alone, you can have Ray LaSalle entirely and totally. And I want to always be your vessel. I want to always be the body and a part of the body of Christ.

Thanks for being a part of the voice of the Nazarene.

Visit us every Sunday at 9am with BNC's Pastor Ray LaSalle.

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