Taking Up The Cross To Experience Revival | Pr Gloria Paul

You're listening to a message to go from Acts Church.

We hope this message will light up your day.

So let's go into today's word, right? Hope none of

you don't stop just now. Right? Just wanted us, I

just thought, you know, God just put this in my

heart because we get so caught up with life, right?

And sometimes we can be seated in one place, but

our mind can be in 101 other places, right? But

I think what the Lord wants us to do is

to be able to be fully present for Him to

speak to us because it's a conversation that He's having, yeah?

So I hope you're all doing well, right? And, you know,

I think it's something that we wanted to do as

a church as well to celebrate Malaysia Day. And, you know,

most of you would know that we have covered the

whole core values together, right? 12 plus 1, yeah? And

so today, it's going to be not the core values.

We're going to go back to the series on revival.

But I just felt that Tyrell helped to list down

all the core values that we have covered. They're pretty

much of different topics, right? We have 13 here. And

different speakers have been unpacking the values differently. And it

all goes back to the Book of Acts to draw

from it. And of course, the challenge for all of

us now is How am I going to leave these

values out? Right? So my encouragement is don't just keep

the book aside just because you are done with it,

but have a visit on it. Meditate, you know, ask

the Lord, how would this look like on my every day?

Not just on a Sunday, right? But when we speak

about Christ-centered, how does it look like when I go

to work? Or when I go to school, it shouldn't

be just on a Sunday thing, right? But it has

to be our everyday automatic. We are, you know, autopilot.

This is how I live my life. That it should

be what values are. When I make decisions, values are

my compass. Whether it's in difficult situations or easy, I

will go back to these values.

Yeah.

So my encouragement is to go back to these 13 values.

look down, look through the notes that you have taken,

listen to our MTGs. If you have forgot, if you

want just a refresher on it, but because we believe

that as the church grow, this is something that we

need to align together, you know, and it's not an

ex-church thing, but it's a God's thing.

Yeah.

So we have to be able to hold on to

it and pass it to the next generation. Yeah, guys,

if we don't catch it, we are not being able

to pass the little ones out there. Yeah. So let's

keep leaving this out. Yeah. All right. So, You know,

for today's message, okay, the title of today's message is

about taking up the cross. You know, I know it's

not an easy task or, you know, a calling that

God has given to us. But it is, as long

as we are His disciples and we want to fully

follow Him, we've got to take up the cross.

Okay.

And do we have a choice? Well, at the end

of the day, God gives us free will. But to

be able to enjoy the fullness of God is when

we can and do what He calls us to do.

So allow me to just read from Matthew chapter 16. Okay,

Matthew 16 · chapter mention

we're going to read through what the Word of God

tells us here. And then we will dive in deeper.

So Matthew 16 verses 24 onwards, it says, Then Jesus

Matthew 16:24

said to his disciples, if anyone desires to come after me,

let him deny himself and take up his cross and

follow me. For whoever desires to save his life will

lose it. But whoever loses his life for my sake

will find it. For what profit? Amen.

Amen.

If you've been a believer for a while, I'm sure

this scripture is not new to us, yeah? But let's

try to unpack. When he says, if anyone desires, how

many of you desire for the Lord?

Yeah?

If we desire for the Lord, what he tells us

here to do is to deny ourselves and take up

the cross and follow me. What does denying ourselves look like?

What does it look like for you? Have you asked

that question before? What does it look like every day?

you know, or the choices I make, the decisions I

have to make. Denying myself, what does it mean, right?

It's a strong word, denying, right? When you say no,

it's not a maybe, but it's a yes or no.

Denying is no, right? And he says to follow me

because if you want to follow Jesus, there's something that

we've got to do, yeah? And then the word continues

on talking about if you desire to save your life,

you will lose it. So that just means if we

choose to only pursue our ways and our choices, then

we are not going to get anywhere at the end

of the day. Because that has not been the plan

of God. God's plan when He created us is to

go after His things, to go after His heart. But

the promise that He gives us here is that when

you lose your life, you will find it. Meaning, when

we say loose, doesn't mean you go aimless and not

knowing what you're doing, but you find yourself in him.

I think that's beautiful. When you sit in his presence,

when you seek his face, you know who your identity is.

that I'm a child of God. I'm not just what

the world tells who I am, whether I'm a better husband,

a better father, or a better wife. No, it's not

all those things that people say, but how God sees you,

I think that's what matters, right? And then you will

find it. And to me, that is the true security

that you have. You know, not like how the world

labels you, but you find the true meaning or the

true purpose when you seek the Lord, yeah? And then,

of course, he asks questions here, right? What profit it

is to man if he gains the whole world and

loses his own soul? Think about it. You can have

all the riches of the world, but if your soul

is not saved, where are we going to get? And

we know that our lives doesn't just end on earth.

There is eternity as well, yeah? So let's just try

to unpack and understand what does denying ourselves actually mean?

And I would say, I mean, I can give you

a reference from what the Bible tells us, but it

also would mean very different for all of you, yeah?

Some of you may come from a pre-believing family and

you may be the only believer and there are some

choices that you've got to make that would seem so

odd for your family. So what would be those stands

that you choose to make, yeah? Yeah. Or it could

be those choices that you tend to make as a

young adult in the office when everyone else is working

so hard, but you choose to show up on a

Sunday and say, you know what? My Sabbath is important, right?

So it can mean very different for all of us

in the different journeys that we are in. But one

thing remains is the Word of God and how He

chose us to live our lives. The word denying here,

when we unpack it, it just means you say no

to something and you say yes to something else. Right?

Simple terms. And when it says carrying the cross, you know,

if you look at it in a physical way, I

don't think the cross is a light thing to carry.

I mean, if you look at what Jesus, the cross

that he had to carry, when he grew weak after

all the slashing, you know, they had to call this

another guy to actually help to carry the cross. That

was the weight. That was, of course, in the physical way.

But if you look at the spiritual side of things,

He was carrying the weight of the world on His

shoulders when He carried the cross. And that is what

He's calling us to do. And that is why, as believers,

we know that life is not going to always be easy. Right?

It's not a promise that we were given when we

said yes to the Lord. But are we alone in this?

Of course not. He is with us. Right? So when

we talk about carrying the cross, it requires a level

of focus. It requires a level of surrender, giving up

and taking the cross. Yeah? Yeah. If you give up

and you don't take up the cross, then something else

is going to fill in. Other distractions in life, other opportunities,

it's going to seem so good and you'll go that way, right?

So it's rather you leave and surrender what you need

to and take up the cross, yeah? And I'm going

to share with you a couple of different strongholds or

another term would maybe different distractions in our lives that

we may need to just learn to surrender in order

for us to carry the cross better. Some of you

may be already carrying the cross in different forms, yeah?

But we may be feeling the weight even more because

we are carrying both worlds. We are trying to do

the things of God. We are trying to honour Him

by carrying the cross. But at the same time, we

are allowing room for the enemy to put on his

strongholds on us as well. So we've got to be

able to learn how to let away that entire thing

that is not of God and just focus on what

He wants us to carry, which is the cross and

to follow Him. So the first thing is that if

we want to identify what are the hidden, strongholds or

things that we need to let go of, we must

have a survey in the attitudes of our hearts. It

all goes back to our hearts, right? The matter of

the heart. And in every area of your thinking that

is filled with hope in God is an area that

is being liberated by Christ. So a good way to

kind of gauge, right, and analyze, okay, am I actually

fully living out the way God wants me to live?

Is to ask yourself whether the things that you believe in,

is it giving you hope?

Yeah?

Because the things of God always gives us hope. right?

There's no such thing as when you, you know, come

to church or when you serve the Lord, there's no

sense of hope. That's not who God is. But if

you are dwelling on things and the matters of life

that seems to be hopeless, that seems to be just

no way out, you're feeling troubled, you're feeling anxious, then

you can know that, oh, this is not of God.

You could be in a relationship, right? And you think

that this person is a great person, But every time

you're talking to this person, you still feel anxiousness. You

feel there's no peace. You're not getting anywhere. Well, that

is not what God wants for us, right? Is it

a relationship that has been surrendered to the Lord? Are

the both of you living your lives in the way

that God wants us to live, yeah? So that's a

good heart check. Whether do we see glimpse of hope

in the way we believe, in the way we live

our lives, yeah? Just have a thought on that, right?

Because any kind of systems or any form of thinking

that does not have hope, it is a stronghold that

has to be pulled down. There's no negotiation that I

want to be of both worlds. The moment you put

your feet on both sides, you're going to drown one day.

Because you're going to get tired. Imagine pleasing two different masters.

Even the word of God says you only have one master.

But if you keep living that two double life, one

fine day you're just going to get tired. Yeah, so

we've got to focus on one master. So the first

thing or the first point that I'd like to help

us understand, right, when we take up the cross, when

we need to deny, what is that first point that

we need to check, right, and see is the world itself.

The stronghold of the world, yeah. The greatest source of

our thoughts, our distractions or the decisions that we make

It all comes from the information that we are flooded

in in this world, on this earth. People's perceptions and

some of these things start from our childhood. The way

you were brought up, the things that your parents would

have told you. Sometimes it's whether the amount of love

that you have received or maybe even the lack of love.

And therefore, our perception about life tend to be determined

by that. Because, you know, my parents said, you know,

you can do this, you're a courageous person, you're a

confident person, then you grow up being that kind of

a person, yeah? But if all your entire life, you're

always feeling defeated, you're always feeling like I'm not good enough,

even as an adult, no matter how old you are,

you will believe in those kind of things, yeah? So

your childhood definitely plays a very big part, yeah? And

of course, we have our media, the social media that

we read, we watch, the people, the interactions that we have.

All these things can also kind of fill in the

perceptions and the way we look at ourselves, right? But

what we need to understand in this world that we

are living in is ultimately, Jesus has to be the

ultimate instructor or the one that shows us what is

right and what is wrong. And so that is why

the values comes in. It has to be the one

that is at the core of everything you do. We

can live in this world, we can read, we can't

run away from these things, right? We can't run away

from the media, we can't run away from our bosses,

our people, right? We see them so often. We are

surrounded by such information. But what is it that keeps

us grounded? That I can hear someone telling this to me.

I can hear such perceptions, even it could be from

my parents. But ultimately, what is God saying? So that

should be the one that helps you to decide, okay,

this is right or this is wrong. Okay, this is wrong,

I think, because God's word says something else. This is

what God tells of me. Yeah, then you can actually gauge.

Because at the end of the day, if you think

about life, I mean, we can have mentors, we can

have leaders around us, but it is your own personal journey.

There will come a point of time, your own crossroads

that you have to make decisions in life, right? And

so then what would be the falling factor that you'll

go back to? What would be that source? Like the

Word of God says, He is the rock, the anchor.

Is He the one that holds on to you? Or

are we making our decisions based on everything else? And

God just comes in a little bit. It shouldn't be that.

He should be the full anchor. So he's the one

that is the ultimate instructor. Now in Hebrews chapter 13,

Hebrews 13:7

verses 7, it says, Remember those who rule over you,

who have spoken the word of God to you, whose

faith follow, answering the outcome of their conduct. Jesus Christ

is the same yesterday, today and forever. Do not be

carried about with various and strange doctrines. So what the

Word of God reminds us here is to remember who

rules you. You can follow people. We can have disciples, discipleships, right?

We do all of that. But the key is that

the one that is leading us, are they being led

by God? That's important for us to gauge, right? Are

they first listening to God's voice?

Yeah?

Yeah. And then it says that the one person that

never changes is God himself. So who we want to

believe in? Someone who keeps changing their mind all the time?

Or would we believe in a God who is the

same yesterday, today and forever? And then the question comes in,

why is it then we don't go enough to God

and we rather go to opinions of people? Just because

they are right in front of us, right? Someone told

me also, chat GPT gives me answers even faster. So

I better go to chat GPT, right? But it's a machine,

it's a robot. But are we tuning in to God

to speak to him, to hear what he is saying?

Because it makes sense, right? If he is someone who

is constant, if he knows our tomorrow, shouldn't we go

to him instead of people who are there? Definitely, we

are grateful for them. But can God be part of it?

Can he be part of our lives? Can we just

don't go to Him for our to-do list? But can

we go to Him because He is the anchor, the

one that holds our life, who holds our world, yeah?

So this should be the Word of God that remains

in our hearts. Our goal must be to conform to

Jesus Christ. In fact, even Paul says in 1 Corinthians 11, 1,'

Imitate me just as I imitate Christ.' Right? He himself

knew that. And I will tell this to anyone who

I am leading as well.

Right?

Imitate me as I imitate Christ. Don't just imitate Pastor

Gloria and the way she talks. That's just who I am.

And you have your own gifting. You have your own calling.

But you can be inspired and follow a leader because

they themselves imitate Christ. And that's important for us to follow.

We hear of stories of many big churches around the

world that sometimes even great leaders tend to fall when

they are not clear of their own stand or their

own heart check. And people blindly follow them because of

the glamour and because of everything that they can do

and speak. But you must take responsibility of who you

are following. Ask yourself, these leaders, these people that I

listen to, you know, even the messages that you hear online,

are they following after God's heart? Yeah, because we are

answerable to God at the end of the day. Now,

in Philippians 3, verse 17, okay, it says here, right,

Philippians 3:17

Philippians 3, 17,' Brethren, join in following my example.' And

note those who so walk as you have us for

a pattern. So it says to walk like how we

walk with the Lord. For many walk of whom I

have told you often and now telling you even weeping

that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ.

Verse 19. Whose end is destruction. Whose God is their

belly and whose glory is in their shame. Who set

their mind on earthly things. So, which country citizenship do

you have? heaven. Yes. Of course, Malaysia, we love our Malaysia. Yeah.

But at the end of the day, we are all

citizens of heaven. And when we are a citizen of

a nation, we live in that way, right? I mean,

we love Malaysia. So we enjoy all the food. We

dress up so well to represent our country. We sing

the Garaku. We honour. We have patriotism. I hope we

have our patriotism, right? We don't forget all of this.

These are things that makes us proud of where we belong, yeah?

But are we proud enough for being citizens of the heavens?

which is, for your information, is going to be our

permanent residence. Yeah, we're all going to share one place.

We're all going to be staying there one fine day

when Jesus comes back. So shouldn't we be investing on

that home as well? Some of us, when we buy

a home, you know, we spend so much of time

with that on earth. But what more this home that

we all are going to go one day? How are

we living our lives to take care of that, to

take care of our souls and more so to remind

more people to win more souls to come with us

because they are going to miss out on this heaven

if they don't know who Christ is, yeah? So what

I'm trying to help us see here is that we've

got to understand what is the truth and what's important

because if we forget all of this along the way,

you know, we forget the things of heaven, when we

forget that Jesus is returning, we're going to be so

caught up with this world You know, we get so drowned.

And that's life. I mean, I can truly relate with

you as even a working adult. We get so caught

up with business. We get so caught up with decisions

and people. Life takes charge of you. Being a parent,

you know, your kids take up so much of your

time every day. Life can just bog us down. Yeah?

But sometimes we just need to take a step back

and say, you know what? What is important? What am

I doing to feed my soul? Because then after a while,

you will just feel drained. We might forget the purpose

of life. Why am I living? Why am I working?

Why am I doing all this? Right? So we've got

to come back to the heart of what matters. Don't

get so caught up with the world. Yeah? Only Jesus,

by His resurrection, proved that He knew the deep mysteries

surrounding mankind. And that is why He conquered death. You know,

to show us that we are able to live And

we are able to overcome. Yeah? So now, speaking about

the world, I think the promise that He has given

to us is that we are a new creation.

Yeah?

A new creation. That is what I mean by knowing

the truth. Turn to the person next to you and

tell them you're a new creation. Yeah? A new creation.

In fact, the Bible always tells us, Nick quoted this

scripture just now in the morning as well, we have

a new heart, a new mind that God always wants

to give us. It's a God of newness. Meaning the

moment you accepted the Lord and when you follow Him,

the old ways is tak guna. You don't have to

worry about it anymore. Whatever sins or whatever problems that

are there, yes, we learn from those things, but don't

allow that to be a baggage that you bring with you, right?

Just like how old things, after a while, when you

keep it so long, it comes up with a smell, right?

unpleasant smell, right? And the same thing is in our

hearts as well. If we keep holding on to the

old things, it brings those kind of feel, right? That

it's still there. Bitterness, unforgiveness, yeah? So get away with

all that and let God do a new thing in

you because He wants to. It says in Ezekiel 36, 26,

I will give you a new heart and put a

new spirit within you. I will take the heart of

stone out of your flesh and give you a heart

of flesh. Yeah? That means He cannot give you both.

It's either one. The heart of stone or the heart

of flesh. Why heart of flesh? Because it's soft. So

anything that He gives, you can receive. You can respond. Yeah?

And that is the heart that we long for. And

that's my prayer every morning. When I pray, I say, God,

give me a soft heart. So whenever you speak to

me today, I can hear. I can respond. Yeah, and

it's not just, you know, missing the point. Yeah, but

I receive it. So that should be our prayer. Hebrews 8.10,

it says, For this is the covenant that I will

make with the house of Israel after those days, says

the Lord. I will put my laws in their mind

and write them on their hearts and I will be

their God and they shall be my people. Is the

Word of God in your heart? Yes? Yeah? It should

be in our hearts. It should be engraved in our hearts.

It should just come out when we are going on

with life. The Word of God just should come. That

is what it means to be in us, right? I

don't need to... I mean, I can have my Bible

with me all the time, but even without flipping the Bible,

I have some of these words already engraved in me. Yeah?

And I can always tune in to what God's Word

is telling. Yeah? Yeah? In 1 Corinthians 2.16, For who

has known the mind of the Lord, that he may

instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ. Yep,

the mind of Christ. Turn to the person next to

you and ask them, do you have the mind of Christ?

What do you think it looks like if you have

the mind of Christ? Peaceful. Right? Do you think it'd

be different? Instead of being Eugene's mind and then you

have Christ's mind, what kind of a father would you be, right?

What kind of a friend you would be? It changes

the perspective, right? If I have the mind of Christ,

I think I won't just think in my own human

way of things, right? Where things are so limited. Things

are just... what the world tells me, but Christ just

means like what the word of God says, everything is

possible through him, right? We are more than conquerors. I'm

his new creation. And there is power in that. Yeah,

there is power. In 2 Corinthians 5, 16, it says, therefore,

from now on, we regard no one according to the flesh.

Even though we have known Christ according to the flesh,

Yet now we know Him does no longer. Therefore, if

anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. All

things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new. Yeah,

all things have become new. And every time I read

this scripture, it just puts a smile on my face

because what a God we serve, right? He's not bothered

about anything. the mistakes or the person you are back

then before you knew Him. All He's interested to know

is now you as a person, a surrendered person who

is able to take up the cross and just follow Him. Yeah,

that is our dear Abba Father who loves you. Now

in Revelations 2, 17, it says, He who has an ear,

let him hear. How many of you have ears this morning? Good, yeah.

what the Spirit says to the churches, to him who overcomes,

I will give some of the hidden manna to eat

and I will give him a white stone and on

the stone, a new name written, which no one knows

except him who receives it. So those who overcomes, that

is what the Word of God tells us. If you

can overcome life, you can overcome whatever life throws you,

tribulations or struggles, The promise is that He's going to

give you that new manna, yeah? And this manna is

when we learned about the Israelites when He dropped manna

fresh from heaven so that they could eat and not

go hungry. And that is who our God is. He

is the bread of life. He is our living water

that truly brings satisfaction, yeah? And so if you're here

and if there are days where sometimes you wonder there's

a longing within you, an emptiness within you, well, it

has to be filled with the bread of life. It

has to be filled with the living water. Yeah, that

is our God. He wants to always fill us. Amen.

So when you are born again, you receive the very

Spirit of God. And through His Spirit, you are birthed

into another realm, which is the kingdom of heaven. That

is how we become citizens of heaven.

Yeah.

So, though your feet are still on earth, through the

vehicle of the Holy Spirit, you are united to the

actual person of Jesus Christ who is seated at the

throne of God. So, we could be still, we are

still standing on earth. We still need to do what

we need to do. We are responsible citizens. Yeah. By

the end of the day, what connects us is the

Holy Spirit to Jesus himself. And he's seated at the

throne of God. So the connection is so important. It's

either we get drowned with the things of the world

or we can be doing what we need to do

at the same time we are connected to who God is.

So our heart has to be attached to the power

of God. You're not alone. Christ is always with you.

Amen?

So how do we attain such wonderful new beginnings? How

do we live our lives as a new creation today?

you know, as a person who is always activated by

the promises of God, well, the first thing is to

receive the Spirit of Christ into our hearts, right? The

Spirit of God is so important. In fact, how you

do this is by your daily confession. Every time you

wake up, up in the morning, you tell this, God,

I welcome the Spirit of God into my life. I

welcome your presence. You know, I'm going to go to

work today. I have this meeting going on. God, may

your presence come. You know, may you be there in

every conversations I'm having. Freely welcome Him. That is how

The Spirit of God moves in us, yeah? And that's

something I have always done, even in my days when

I was teaching. And now when I even do trainings,

I always pray for every person who comes. You know,

as I speak, I may not be preaching, but I

am an instrument of God. So whatever I say can

still impart something to someone. I believe in that because

you're a child of God, yeah? So why don't you

pray for those things? Pray for the people that are

in your life, for your bosses. Speak life. into the situation, yeah?

Speak life into your family, into your homes. Do that

and you will see things change, yeah? So receive the

Spirit of God. Study the Word of God to direct

us Don't just read it, but study. It's a big

difference there. Meaning you go deeper, yeah? Make sure, you know,

I mean, we are only a few weeks away from December.

So where are we with our reading of the Bible?

Maybe some of us started, had a resolution at the

start of the year and finished the Bible, you know?

But where are we at? Okay, where are we at

with that? Maybe you just want to, you have to

kickstart again. It's okay, never too late, right? You want

to start again with Genesis? No problem, do that. As

long as you're getting somewhere, yeah? So let's get on

with the Word of God. If it's helpful, try to

get a good study Bible. Yeah, maybe the Bible you're

reading is an old King James and you're struggling with that.

Don't do that. Okay, pick up a new, if you want,

you know, a study Bible to go deeper. Do that.

Sometimes these are the practical things that you need to do. Yeah,

I know someone who said, you know, reading the book

of Numbers is difficult, but you're still reading it. Chapter 2,

chapter 3, ask what you got from it. Nothing. Okay,

but because I need to read the Bible, I just

read every day. Don't, don't, I mean, being a Christian

is not supposed to be that way. We got to

get something out of it. God is a God who

is practical, yeah? So if you can't understand, then change

the way you do it. Talk to someone about it,

whether it's through homes, you know, you can have your own,

you know, devotion group, right? But do something. You got

to ask yourself, at this stage of my life, am

I growing? If you're not growing, then you have to

do something else to do, to change, right? If not,

after some time, you're just going to feel tired and

you don't know what you're doing, yeah? So let's have

a heart check. And of course, you know, what we

need to do is whatever that is in our lives

that is not like Jesus, we need to crucify it.

That is exactly what denying is, yeah, to let go

of it. Only you would know what are the decisions

that you are making that may not be pleasing to God.

The thoughts, the old things that you have to let

go of to surrender, forgiveness. Let's do that. Yeah, because

if you want to be experiencing the new, the old

has to go. There's no way, okay, I'm going to

keep a little bit of the old because, you know, memories, no,

no such thing. Leave it away completely so that you

can experience the newness of God. Amen. Can we do that?

Are we catching something from this?

Yeah.

So that we don't just get so bogged down with

the things of the world. I mean, yeah, we can

read so many things in the news, right? I mean,

there are constantly things that are going on and some

things can be very disheartening when we read. But I

think as believers, we shouldn't just get so disheartened. I mean,

it's just human to feel that way. But can we

bring that to God? When was the last time we

prayed for the situation in our country, right? A news

that we hear somewhere in different parts of the world.

Do we pray about it? Instead of talking about it

and getting even more sad about it, right? Let's learn

to surrender to God. Let's bring it to Him. Let

God be part of our everyday and it makes a

whole big difference, yeah? So that's the first stronghold that

we got to remind ourselves about. Though we are living

in the world, we've got to be always connected with Jesus.

And He's the one who determines and shows us who

we are as an individual, yeah? Now, the second thing

is the stronghold of our experiences, yeah? Experiences. Now, why

do I say this is that sometimes our experience can

be the one that we draw our conclusion from, yeah?

our first-hand knowledge about something, just because we have walked

a couple of years, we have seen certain things in life, well, good.

We need people who are experienced, okay? Those who, what

they say, was eaten more salt, yeah? It's a good thing, right?

But at the same time, sometimes if we are not careful,

we can get so caught up with all these experiences

in life and the faith in God tends to go down.

What God wants is not how much you know, your knowledge,

or how much you have, you know, experienced, your long

list of experiences in your resume. He doesn't see all that.

But what he wants us is, can we have the

faith to see it happen despite not being able to

see it yet? You get what I mean here, yeah?

So I can be believing for, you know, a healing

for so long, but because I walked with God for

10 over years, I've not seen that healing happen. And

then I just give up, right? That is what I

mean by the struggle of experience. Because I've not seen

it happen. Because I've seen maybe people who have passed

on praying for healing and have not happened. Therefore, I'm

going to stop believing. That's the danger there. But the

thing about God is, He's a God of eternity. He

doesn't see things the way we see it. We might

get disheartened thinking, oh, this person prayed so hard and

yet God took away their life. How could that happen?

And it's human to think that way. But for God,

He sees it differently. He sees the person differently. He

sees their life differently. Yeah, He has a reason for everything.

So can we be able to step out of that

I know thing just because I've experienced it, right? Let's

step out from that and have a little bit more

of faith.

Yeah.

Who was the father of faith in the Bible? Abraham Lincoln?

Father Abraham. Our ex-kids will answer faster than all of

you lah. Okay. Abraham, right? At what age did he

get a child? When he was what? 100 plus, right?

right and don't you think he could be someone who

has I mean 100 imagine living that long he could

have thought right I mean I've lived for so many

years nothing has happened he has tried having a child

but he could have stopped there but God gave him

a promise and remember when God gave him the promise

it was not like it happened yesterday I mean it

happened the next day it took some years to happen.

So meaning when he got that promise, he could have

like shied away and say, you know what? Yeah, okay,

God has said this, but I've lived for so many

years and if it's not going to happen, maybe it's

not going to happen. Remember Sarah had an encounter where

she laughed, right? The word of God says, because I mean, like,

I mean, she laughed in a way where, oh, is

this going to actually happen? I've been waiting for so long.

How many of us have been in that place, right?

Sometimes you wait so long and you just oh well,

is it actually going to happen? Yeah. But because Abraham

was not caught up with his years of experience or wisdom,

but he still took God's word. And I think that

is something that we can glean on. Don't you think so?

Right?

Because if he chose to do the otherwise and think that,

you know what, it's not going to happen, he wouldn't

have had a child. But because he held on to

the promise of God and chose to believe in it,

we have the full story of Abraham. Not just the

father of faith, but the father of Isaac. Yeah? And

so that is why we can see in Romans, if

you can read Romans 4, verses 20. Yeah, this whole

Romans 4:20

chapter talks about faith and Abraham. Right? In Romans 4,

Romans 4:20

verses 20, it says here, he did not waver, he

meaning Abraham, he did not waver at the promise of

God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory

to God and being fully convinced that what he had promised,

he was also able to perform. This was Abraham, yeah?

He did not waver. He didn't shake and think, oh,

that didn't happen. Or he was just human like you

and me. He would have had 101 thoughts in his

mind about this. Um, but he still stood firm. Yeah.

And what got him to go firm is the faith

that strengthened. That's what the word of God says, strengthened

in faith. And some of us may need that. You're

waiting for an unsaid prayer for so many years. God

has not given up. Why do we need to give up? Yeah.

We need to strengthen ourselves every day. We need to

keep saying, God, you have promised this. I'm going to

declare this. It's going to come to pass, right? this

is strengthened and then it goes on saying that giving

glory to God and he was fully convinced not just

50% he's fully convinced that what God promised him he

was able to perform and that is why he's called

the father of faith yeah not because he had it

easy he just saw it happen overnight but it was

years Years of prayer, years of surrender, until the very

last moment when God told him to give up his son.

Did he do that? He did, right? He went all

the way because faith, that is what faith does, I think, right?

Faith just, you go, you go all the way. Nothing

holds you back. And the thing is that God sees,

God sees your every action. God sees your every decision.

And what God was more focused on in Abraham is

the way he is poised at the end of the day.

It was not about whether he did it because God

still wanted him to keep his son. But how was

his response? And so the same thing for all of

us today. God wants to see what is your response.

If he's calling you to answer a call, to do something,

to go somewhere, He wants to first see how will

you respond. What will be your immediate answer to that?

That is what he wants to listen.

Yeah?

So this is the nature of faith. And faith must

triumph over experiences until experiences conform to the Word of God.

So you can have vast experiences in life, but all

those things has to come back to the Word of God.

It has to be You know what? I've learned all

of this, but what is it that keeps it grounded?

What the Word of God tells us.

Yeah?

What the Word of God tells us. And I think

the key thing here is, of course, the Word of

God has to rule our hearts. We may value our experiences,

but what must rule our hearts is the Word of God.

In other words, even if there is no healing yet,

we shouldn't conclude that healing is not happening because God's

provision is eternal. Eternal. He would do it according to

His will. So just because we don't see things in

our own way, It doesn't mean it's not happening. Yeah,

it's just, it's not happening in His ways. And that

is something we just need to learn to submit and

to surrender. And so why I put this point, right,

is because I feel this is something that the enemy

tries to use to pull us down. You know, when

we talk about carrying the cross, our experiences can sometimes

take too much of space on our shoulders sometimes. To

the point we have no space to carry the cross

of God and to follow Him. Because we're so bogged

down with, you know what? I know this. I know better.

I can do this my way. I keep going and going.

But what if God is telling you to let go

of all that and follow me freely, right? Because as

you age, as you go on in life, right? There's

going to be more things that life is going to

throw you. Yeah?

Yeah.

There's going to be more experiences. There's going to be

more people that you're going to encounter. So if you

can't let go or learn how to navigate that at

an earlier age, what more as you grow? Yeah? So

that is why catch it when you're even younger. Right?

And you can continue to live freely and focused. Right? Yeah?

So that's the next thing that we got to catch.

Give ourselves that room for God's word. our lives surrendered

to God's Word. Amen? Now, the last point here is

the whole stronghold of the wrong doctrines that are around us. Yeah?

Wrong doctrines that are around us. It says in Matthew 24,

Matthew 24:4

verse 4, See to it that no one misleads you. Right?

See to it that no one misleads you. And I

put this point here because Um, you know, we, we love,

we live in a world of times when there's just

so much of knowledge, so much of information, and it

can also be this, you know, it sounds so good, right?

It sounds like I want to listen to everything. And

when I say everything, I am referring to even sometimes

messages that we hear in the media. Yeah. And that's

a danger sometimes when we try to just tune in

to any other speaker, any other people that we may

not know. Because then we don't know from what perspective

are they talking from? What background are they talking from?

And we allow this word to come in. We think

we are just listening. But everything that we listen gets

into our spirit, gets into our inner man. And if

you're not careful enough, That is the spirit that has

been activated in us, yeah? So always be very cautious

of who do you listen to. And when you listen,

can you be discerning enough to know whether this is

truly from the Lord or this is just the wisdom

of men, yeah? Because the wisdom of men can sound

very nice. You can easily go to ChatGPT and generate

a full sermon if you want to. Anyone can be

a preacher these days. You can be a very good

speaker and speak in the front and go viral with

all your social media accounts. I mean, all these things

are what the world looks for. But as a believer,

can you actually, when you listen to someone speaking, can

you say and know that, yes, this is from the

word of God? Yeah, because we've already been seeing, I mean,

this is not new news to us, right? We've been

seeing how the Bible has been twisted to meet the

needs of the people. Yeah, the different languaging has been

changed because we want it to look and feel good

for people. Because if you're going to read a scripture

that says, deny yourself and take up the cross, that's

not something everyone wants to hear. Yeah. So they want

to hear something even nicer, that God is your provider.

God is good to you. Well, all those nice things

that you want to keep hearing. And that is how

the Word of God is twisted. How much do we

know the Word of God? I know this is a

basic thing that we constantly hear as believers, but that

is what God wants us to catch. Even in the

book of Matthew, when we read about the last days,

It has been alarmed. It's been warned to us that

this is what's going to happen. There's going to be

false prophets. Not going to, there's already false prophets all

around us. So how then do we respond? How then

do we speak to them? We can be led by

other people, but we must take responsibility that we are

not misled by others. Study and know the word of God.

And of course, staying sensitive. to the voice of God, right?

Saying sensitive to the voice of God. Um, you know,

the other day I was having a conversation with someone

and then they were talking about how, um, you know, they,

they are, they know someone who is, um, from a different, um,

what do you call this? Um, like a, like a

Jehovah Witness kind of a faith, you know? So, you know, just,

just friends with them and then, they were talking even

more about their faith. You know, they're talking so boldly

about the Bible and teaching. And, you know, this person

told me, I mean, how? I mean, I myself don't

know how to actually have a conversation with them, right?

Or am I even bold enough to actually talk about

my Bible and have conversations about who God is? And

so sometimes when we look at these people, they go

all out, right? But can I know the difference then?

Because they have their own Bible. They use the name

of Jesus. It's easy to identify another faith, like Hinduism, Buddhism,

because they're different. But how about these teachings that sometimes

tend to sound? And when you listen to their worship songs,

they actually sound like our worship songs. They play instruments.

They have full bands, right? So when I listen to

those songs, can I be sensitive and know that something

is not right? Or do I just sing along and

think that it's just another song?

Yeah?

So this is what I mean by just being a

little bit more cautious of what we tune in. Just

because someone shares the real to you, don't just be

quick to listen and watch it and, oh, it's a

good thing, and then I share it to everyone else. Yeah?

Let's be more responsible Christians. Can we do that?

Yeah?

Let's know what are we reading, what are we receiving,

what are we passing on? Because you guys play a

very big responsibility. Because if you don't get it right...

We're going to pass on the wrong thing to the

next generation. Yeah? So we have to get our foundation right.

We have to know what is the truth and what

is the lie. When the enemy came to Eve, he

was so deceiving. He didn't say nasty things, but he said,

you will be like God when you eat of this fruit.

So who wouldn't want to be like God? So she thought, oh, okay.

I did it.

And that is how deceiving the enemy can be, yeah?

So we've got to be sensitive enough to know what

is of God and what is not of him, yeah?

Satan's plan is to make us somehow accept through our upbringing,

our experiences or even all these false doctrines that certain

portions of the life of Christ are untrue or not

valid in our case. So sometimes when we read certain

things in Bible, we think, okay, this is not for me.

The enemy might want us to think that way. But

we need to hold on to the word of God.

Every battle we face in life is over the word

and whether we can build our lives upon the faithfulness

and integrity of God. Yeah. Yeah. And so as I close,

I'm just going to say this, that we need to

build our lives and decisions based on the word of God.

It shouldn't be the other way around. Don't try to

fit God's word to wherever that's convenient. Just because I got, okay,

this small part, okay, God's word can come here. God's

word can come here. That's not how it works. God's

work has to be the middle, the center. And then

my life revolves around it. Yeah. That is what it

means to deny ourselves, to carry the cross. And then

we can follow Jesus wholeheartedly. Yeah? Because He will enable

us to do that as well. Amen?

Yeah?

And so let's just continue to meditate on this as

we close, right? Think about it. Think about your world.

Think about your experiences in life. Is it taking a

big part or replacing the faith that God wants you

to have? And the doctrines around us. How aware are

we about what's the truth? And are we holding on

to the truth of God? And let's not just take

this on our shoulders, but allow God to lead us

so that we can take on the cross. Amen?

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

information on our church, please visit xchurch.org. We are also

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is going to be a good week ahead for you.

God bless.