Yield | Jay Greiner

Let's make Jesus glad and the devil mad while I switch mics.

Hallelujah.

Everybody say, Heavenly Father, I'm grateful for this church where I can grow.

I'm a man or a woman of your word.

I like to study your word.

I'm a lover of righteousness.

I'm a lover of revelation.

And so I plant your word in my heart this morning, and I engraft that word on the inside.

And I allowed it to grow.

I yield to the watering process.

The watering of your word causes me to grow.

And I shall bear much fruit.

I shall yield a huge harvest.

All for your glory.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

Hallelujah.

Hallelujah.

Well, you may be seated, y'all already have automatically.

Praise the Lord.

And so, you know, I got I got to uh Selena and I got to preach on Wednesday night.

Light up your world.

We just started that series, and I just encourage you to come on Wednesday nights for the entire month of October.

It's been the first one was really powerful.

I don't, you know, I was the one preaching, so I don't mean to sound like I'm patting myself on the back, but but the Holy Spirit was here, and there was an anointing, and it was fun.

And it's fun this morning.

And so I did something on Wednesday night that I, you know, I've only done a couple of times, and that is I just explained, I went through the purpose of why, why are we here?

Why are you here this morning?

Why have we gathered together?

So just that one point.

I'm not going to repeat the whole message that I did on Wednesday, but just if you, you know, think about why are we gathered here in Brother Hagin's book, Plans, Purposes, and Pursuits.

I believe we have a copy of that out in the Media Center.

If you've never read it, it's a great book.

Uh but we're to pursue the heart of God together.

And we're to renew our minds to the word of God, right?

That happens when we're at home reading the Bible on our own, but it also happens right here under the anointing.

We believe in supernatural hearing, don't we?

Amen.

And then I got this out of Hebrews 10 verse 24.

Hebrews 10:24

It says, and let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works.

That's another reason why you're here this morning.

Whether you believe it or not, whether you realize it or not, it says to let us, in Hebrews 10, 24, it says, let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works.

So that word consider means to observe and it means to understand.

And that would be impossible to do if we weren't gathered together, right?

If you were at home in bed watching this on live stream, God bless our live stream audience.

I hope you're eating a good breakfast this morning.

Maybe, you know, you have some good blueberry muffins in the oven coming out of the oven.

That's the oven timer going off right now.

I'm just I'm just playing.

But, you know, what for those of us that are here, we're to consider one another, to observe one another, to understand.

That comes through relationship, that comes through getting to know one another, right?

In order to stir up love and good works.

That word love, that's agape love right there.

So that's the God kind of love.

That means we allow each other to start over, and we we, no matter what mistake, no matter what somebody's done to you or said to you last week, none of that matters.

We get to start over this morning in love, and we're stirring each other up unto good works.

And verse 25, we're not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together.

In other words, some assembly required, right?

Don't you hate that when you read that on a box, you thought the whole thing was put together, and you get it home and you're like, man.

But I'm telling you, this kind of assembling brings joy to my heart.

It brings joy to your heart, doesn't it?

As a manner of some, but exhorting one another.

It's not just the preacher exhorting, it's each one of you exhorting one another, and so much more as we see the day approaching.

Jesus is coming back soon, isn't he?

And so we're exhorting one another that he's coming back soon, right?

And that we're gathering more.

I said we're gathering more.

Doesn't it make your heart be filled with joy knowing that we gather, that hungry people gather?

And so, amen.

I just, the purpose of our gathering is to seek and pursue the heart of God together.

So there's unity and we're in one accord.

Amen.

I kind of just wanted to preach this morning about uh yielding and being yielded vessels.

My title is just simple, it's just yield.

And you know, yielding is not stopping.

I'm gonna compare it to driving right off the bat.

I don't think I plan to do that.

But uh, you know, if you go to Tulsa, they don't know how to yield.

It says yield, but they just stop.

You're getting on the freeway and just you have to slam the brakes on and come to a complete stop.

And every now and then that happens in Houston, but like that happens once, and that driver learns, right?

You know, like uh Selena, you know, when we're driving, I'll say things like, I don't always get on the freeway at 25, but when I do, I'm behind this lady in the gold Lexus.

And I'll start complaining all about it.

And Selena will be like, She's living her best life now.

She she stole Joel Osteen's book title.

And like that's her way of saying, hey, I don't want to hear about it.

She's over, she doesn't care.

She, you know, she might die in the next 30 seconds, but she doesn't care.

Why?

And I don't want to hear about it.

If I'm complaining about how fast people drive, she's like, they're living their best life now.

And and then, you know, if you shut up, you'll be living your best life now.

That's the way she's saying that to me.

But yielding, you know, does not mean stopping.

And the plan of God, if you'll just yield to it, the plan of God can just take over and get you right back on track, right where you need to be going.

And uh, and it's an easy process.

So let's start out in Romans chapter 6.

Romans 6 · chapter mention

I'm gonna start in verse 11.

I I like to use most, I'm gonna be reading it out of the King James Version, but I really like it in the message.

If you go back later and read Romans chapter 6 in the message, I use that as one of our baptism scriptures, really, most of the chapter.

Romans 6 · chapter mention

And so uh, verse 11.

Romans 6, 11 and the King James.

Likewise, reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive, everybody say alive, unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

And you know, why don't you look uh like as I'm reading this, picture baptism.

Picture that you died, and now you're alive to Christ.

Amen.

Verse 12.

Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, as ye should obey it in the lust thereof.

Uh neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but yield, everybody say yield, yourselves unto God as those that are alive from the dead.

We are alive to Christ, amen.

And your members as instruments of righteousness unto God, for sin shall not have dominion over you, for ye are not under the law, but under grace.

Hallelujah.

So I want you to see that from verse 14 that when you yield, uh you're allowing something to have dominion over you.

And so yield, it means to bring to or bring near or to bring into one's fellowship or intimacy.

That's the biblical Greek meaning of the word yield.

But I also looked it up in Webster's 1828 dictionary, and it does mean what you think it means.

It means to submit or to comply, and it also means a different meaning, and we're gonna go back and forth between a lot of these meetings, this meanings, this morning.

It also means to produce, as in land or stock or funds, to give in return for labor, or in other words, to make a profit, right?

We're yielding fruit in our lives that's making God a profit.

In other words, it's bringing God a harvest.

We're to bring God a harvest on the seed and the inheritance that He's placed on the inside of us.

Amen?

And so you everybody is yielded to something.

Are you yielded to sin?

Are you yielded to flesh?

Or are you yielded to the spirit?

Are you yielded to the plan of God for your life?

Um are you advancing your own kingdom or your own ego, right?

We need to be advancing God's kingdom.

And so we're living in the last days.

I just want to encourage you that we really don't have any more time to waste.

And maybe you feel like you're behind, maybe you feel like you're under a load this morning.

I just want to say that only God can redeem time.

He created time.

We think of time like in a box, like I'm gonna open up my phone and I'm gonna start a timer, or I'm gonna look at a calendar.

And God created time and he can redeem time.

And he's the best editor.

He has like the fastest computer up there.

He's able to edit so you know, your life story, and just take out chapters and add this and change that and get you right back on track because that's what the blood of Jesus does, and he sees you when he looks at you, he sees you as perfect.

Amen.

And so my point number one is yield good fruit.

In Colossians 1:10 and the Passion Translation, uh, it says, We pray that you would walk in the ways of true, real, authentic righteousness, pleasing God in every good thing you do, then you'll become fruit-bearing branches, yielding to his life and maturing in the rich experience of knowing God to his fullness.

Colossians 1:10

So a yielded vessel is fully yielded to the Zoe life of God.

That's the God kind of life, amen.

And so it produces good, mature faith.

It produces good and mature fruit.

And so Jesus teaches us that we must abide in him.

We're gonna turn over to John 15 here in a second, but as we do, as we flip over to John 15, I'm gonna flip there myself.

And as I'm flipping there, Jesus has so much to say about fruit and being and yielding good fruit.

Who wants to yield good fruit?

Amen.

You know, um, you ever like like on a hot summer day when it's over 100 degrees outside, you ever like pulled a fresh peach right out of the cooler?

You know, you're gonna gone to the park or you've gone to like we used to go to baseball games, Ethan's baseball games back in the day.

We would be sweating in the stands, and we'd reach in and grab a fresh peach, and you know, you take a bite and it's juicy.

It's just it's so good.

And um nobody likes uh terrible fruit, right?

Um we we like ripe fruit and and we like juicy fruit.

And so um we need to be an example for those around us, amen, and bear good fruit.

And so uh in John 15, starting verse 1, Jesus says, I am the true vine, and my father God is the vine dresser.

Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he God takes away, and every branch that bears fruit, he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.

Um hold on, real quick.

I'm just gonna quote a scripture.

Um Hebrews 12 says, uh, let lay aside, let us lay aside every weight and sin which does so easily ensnare us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.

And so in Hebrews it's it's saying that we it's our job to lay aside those sins.

It's our job to lay aside those weights.

But in John 15, uh it's God's job to prune.

He prunes us.

And it's God's job, and he cleans us.

We're about to find that out in verse 3.

You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.

And so uh I just, you know, I was reading this yesterday, and I wasn't I wasn't even really gonna talk about yielding good fruit.

My point number two is yielding to the yield to the pruning process.

If you're taking notes, yield to the pruning process.

And I think back over my life, I, you know, I was I was uh out in my backyard yesterday reading this, and I at that very moment I'm reading this scripture and I walked into a tree branch and it hit my head, and I'm like, oh, I need to just cut that off.

And I realized I'm reading about pruning while I need to go do some pruning in the natural.

And um, and so I started thinking back though, all of the moments that that pruning has happened to me.

You know, I was growing up, I worked at Lakewood as a teenager, and uh it wasn't just a job for me.

I knew that was my future.

I know I knew that God was setting me up, that that that was my forever.

That's the way I treated it, that's the way uh I worked in the television department doing all things technical.

And when I was a senior in high school, uh my dad and my parents took me to lunch, and even to take me to lunch on a Sunday, I had to miss work, you know.

So I thought that was kind of prophetic, really.

And so I missed work because we worked through Sunday morning and Sunday night.

Sunday was a, you know, all day was a work day.

And so I took off work and we went to lunch, and and he explained how he was starting a church, and he would ask me to help him.

And what did I say?

I said yes, of course.

I didn't need any time to think about that, but that was pruning.

What was happening?

Uh I tried to hold on to work at Lakewood while we started this church, and it was really impossible.

And I would go back and I would try to fit in, but I never really fit in.

I did like two special projects, and that was it.

The grace had lifted off of that, and at the same time, the church is growing so much faster.

And I realized there wasn't anything at the church that I was willing to miss.

I wasn't willing to miss a Sunday night, I wasn't willing to miss a Wednesday night.

Uh, right in the middle of that, we started having prayer.

I was there at every prayer service.

We had praise and worship practice, and I ran sound.

I wasn't about to miss that.

And so um God was pruning me, and pruning sometimes feels it's live flesh, you know?

So it pruning is not always dead.

You're God is pruning live tissue, and you feel it, and uh and it can bring pain.

And I just want you to encourage you that in verse 3 you are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.

God is speaking words of comfort to you.

God is speaking words of encouragement to you, and it doesn't have to hurt.

That process doesn't have to hurt.

It means to be clean, the word clean in the Greek means to be purified by fire, like a vine cleansed by pruning, and so fitted to bear more fruit.

Amen.

It's it also means free from corrupt desires, right?

From sin and from guilt.

And I like this one.

Free from every admixture of what is false.

Man, when you know, deception is everywhere in our society.

It's everywhere online, it's every night on the news.

It is never ending, and it's so frustrating, right?

You know, you're you're watching the news, just uh Talafrico, where has he been?

It's been like two weeks.

He missed, he wasn't out on the campaign trail.

You, you know, I've read all the rumors.

I don't know if they're substantiated yet, but it looks like he was in a loony bin for the last two weeks, and yet he's running for Congress.

So how is that for Senate?

So um, anyways, uh there's there's deception all around us, but instead we can be clean by the word of God.

It means to be sincere, to be genuine, to be blameless, innocent, unstained with the guilt of anything.

God already removed your guilt.

The blood of Jesus, Jesus paid it all.

He took your guilt.

There's no reason to be uh uh ensnared by your past.

Amen.

And so in verse 4, abide in me and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me.

And we've studied the word abide quite a bit.

It means to tarry, to not to depart, and it means to continue to be present.

In other words, never leave, right?

To be held, to be kept continually.

And in verse 5, I am the vine, you are the branches.

He who abides in me and I in him bears much fruit, for without me you can do nothing.

Without him, I can do nothing.

Without him, you can do nothing.

I need Jesus.

I have a great marriage, but I need Jesus.

I live in a nice house, but I need Jesus.

I drive a really nice truck.

I I like it.

I try to struggle, not saying I love it, because you only love people.

I don't love things, but I do like it very much.

But I still need Jesus.

I still need God, I still need the Holy Spirit to lead, guide, and direct me, to comfort me, to encourage me.

Every believer needs encouragement, and we get that encouragement from the Holy Spirit, amen.

And so um, without Him, we're nothing.

So uh notice here though, like let's just say that this was we were growing grapes, right?

The branch does not strain to manufacture the grape, right?

Uh it's the but the grape stays connected to the vine and it receives whatever it needs to produce that fruit.

And so we're we're like a tree planted by the river, amen.

We're strong, we're we're yielding fruit, we're producing good fruit in perfect timing for the Lord, amen.

And so when Jesus comes back, he's gonna find us faithful.

For some of y'all, this is a really big faith statement.

I'm looking at some, no, I'm just playing.

Looking at this section over here.

Uh but I'm telling you, God is, he's he's wanting to see good fruit in our lives.

And um, it's a power, a powerful picture of yielding to him to know that we get all of our nutrients from him.

All we have to do is leave our roots grounded in him.

Amen.

And so we don't produce the fruit of the spirit by trying harder in our own strength, but we yield to the spirit and allow him to develop his character in us.

Amen.

Amen.

If anyone, verse 6, if anyone does not abide in me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered, and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned.

You know, I just it it never ceases to amaze me.

I think about the withering process.

You know, the people who separate, the people who leave here, maybe they let a root of bitterness in, maybe they let a little bit of a fence in, and the next thing they know, they go from sitting on the front row, the back row, like two services, and then boom, they're gone.

And I just think like how quickly their lives fall apart.

And I'm not saying that with any kind of pride at all or arrogance at all.

I just, you know, like people completely lose their way.

We've had people like abandon their kids.

Like, what were you thinking?

You spent like decades here, and then you leave, and and it all falls apart really quickly.

And I I'm I'm always taken back by how quick in any church in America, like when when somebody pulls away offended, some people get offended from by other people's problems.

Have you ever seen that happen, right?

You know, and the person that they're offended for, they're not offended enough to leave, and they get over it, they get healed, and then these other people who were offended by they they're gone, and it's like, what?

And so I'm telling you, we we need to watch our hearts in order to bear good fruit.

Because uh, you know, it's you know, it when life squeezes, what comes out?

Is it just lemon juice?

Is it sour?

No, I'm telling you, uh the life of God comes out, the love of God comes out, and and uh the grit of God comes out of your spirit, amen?

So, verse 7 if you abide in me and my words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you.

And so I just think about this church being a word and spirit church, and the importance of it being a word and spirit church, and because that's an Important statement if you uh if you abide in me, but this little port portion right here, and my words abide in you.

That you allow that word, you know.

John Osteen would say that all the time.

He put the word in, so when you need it, it comes out, right, Pastor Joseph?

He reminded me of that last week.

And so um we put the word in so when we need it, it comes out, but we have to allow it to be engrafted into our spirits, into our hearts.

Amen.

Those words abide.

And so um, you know, I I kind of, you know, people have been here for a long time.

We're tempted to take this church for granted, or the makeup of this church.

This church is is um created by the Holy Spirit.

So we didn't do this.

Pastor didn't like read a book to figure out how to get every nationality, every you know, all walk of life.

When you look around, um why we're diverse.

And then you know, you have people driving all the way from Seely.

That's what an hour and what?

Hour and 20, 15, something like that?

But it depends on traffic.

Well, uh God has graced you to do that all these years, amen.

And so um, so so people, hungry people gather, like I was saying earlier, and and we're a word and spirit church.

So, you know, some people are just all spirit, and they have these like all-night praise and worship.

Uh, not that there's anything wrong with a night of worship, but they just go on and on and on with no purpose.

We have a purpose, we know our purpose.

When we gather here, we know our purpose.

And I believe, I said this on Wednesday, the the better we clarify our purpose of gathering, the more God is gonna use us.

The stronger the anointing is gonna be, the more miracles we're gonna see.

Amen?

And so don't take for granted that we have the word and the spirit, that the spirit of God dwells in here, and that there's healing power.

There's not every church around that does that.

There's some some churches, they uh they're all spirit, they pray, but they don't teach the word.

They don't go deep into the word.

We go deep in the word.

Maybe if that doesn't happen on a sunny morning, it happens on a sunny night and a Wednesday night.

So I encourage you to come back, take every opportunity to grow.

Amen.

Take every opportunity to bear good fruit.

And so, uh, and to get the word in you, because when you need it, it's gonna come out, right?

We're abiding in him, and his words are abiding in us.

Verse 8 by this my Father is glorified that you bear much fruit, so you will be my disciples.

Amen.

So, how is God glorified?

He's glorified in us, bearing much fruit.

Good fruit, right?

In yielding to the pruning process and growing good fruit.

Amen.

And so another scripture about yielding is in Colossians, the Colossians 1 prayer.

I'm gonna read it out of the Passion Translation.

Colossians 1.10 in the Passion Translation.

Uh, we pray that you would walk in the ways of true righteousness, pleasing God in every good thing you do.

Then you'll be uh then you'll become fruit-bearing branches, yielding to his life and maturing in the rich experience of knowing him, knowing God in his fullness.

Amen.

Did I read that earlier?

Feels like I did.

Um I just want to turn to it in my own Bible.

Hallelujah.

Colossians 1 prayer.

It's really good.

How many of you have prayed the Colossians 1 prayer over yourself, over your family, maybe over your kids?

It's a great one to pray over your kids.

And so uh we're we're becoming fruit-bearing branches, yielding to God's life on the inside of us.

And uh, and that was in verse 10.

Let's pick it up in 11 in the New King James.

We have time.

Strengthened with all might.

That word strengthened means to make strong and confirm and enable.

We're enabled by the strength of God.

Amen.

Brother Travis down here, he's enabled by the strength of God.

Amen?

With all might, according to his glorious power.

It's God's glorious power that's on the inside of us, right?

For all patience and long-suffering with joy.

So it starts listing some of the fruits of the Spirit right there.

Verse 12, giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light.

He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins.

Amen.

Go back to verse 12.

Giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers.

You are qualified.

Amen.

Say that.

I am qualified.

What are we qualified to do?

We're qualified to be partakers of what?

The inheritance of the saints in the light.

So, did you know that God has an inheritance inside of you?

God has an inheritance inside of you in each and every one of us.

And we have been qualified to be partakers, not just of his inheritance, but also for his inheritance in one another.

Look around.

Say, do you have an inheritance for me?

Hallelujah.

Man, I'm just all of us together, linked arm in arm.

Like I said earlier, we are a family, but you have a supply here of friendship, of encouragement through the power of the Holy Spirit, right?

And so he's delivered us from the power of darkness and he's conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love through his power.

It's all about his power.

Amen?

Amen.

So we're able to yield good fruit.

And so also, just uh going back to verse 10, uh ever increasing in the knowledge of God.

Did you know that we're steadily growing?

Our fruit is steadily growing.

There's no GMOs, there's no genetically modified organisms, right, in us.

We have the pure DNA straight from heaven, right?

And we're growing fruit.

So there's not, we've not been uh modified in some lab somewhere.

Amen.

We have we're real, we're authentic.

The faith that we believe is real.

We just had a youth event yesterday, and uh Celine and I were we were on our way home from that event, and we just began to talk about the event and just youth ministry in general.

You know, like we've been doing this for decades.

She ran into uh one of our students, like 10 years ago, students, you know, that's she's now a school teacher.

And so those moments like that make me feel, not her, but make me feel a little bit older.

I'm sorry, just we look in the mirror and realize, man, we have done youth ministry for a long time.

And uh, but we were just thinking, like the kids, they require authenticity.

They know that we're being real, they know that we can trust that they can trust us.

We have a track record with them, but that happens like similarly, like I was explaining earlier, but it happens with relationships.

It happens as we've we've friended them and we've talked to them and we've gotten to know them and we pray with them and we're there, we prove that we're there.

And we go to a ball game or two, or we, you know, we care about what they care about.

And uh, and you know, and and then we take them to putt-putt golf and we win.

Amen.

Because if you can't win against a bunch of teenage boys at putt-putt, you ain't trying.

Hallelujah.

Especially if you grew up in the 80s and you've been to putt-putt every now and then.

Hallelujah.

It was a good good competition, anyways.

But we are bearing good fruit, amen.

So uh, you know, if you're living another life uh that's that's it's a counterfeit version of what God has made you to be.

God has created you, and he's authentic.

So you be authentic.

Refuse to put the same facade up that the rest of the world does, whether it be on social media or whatever.

You know, we we tend to compartmentalize our life, and that's what I appreciate about our pastor, my dad.

He's the same guy on Sunday as he is on Monday morning.

And, you know, you you you get what you see, you see what you get.

Like he's just he's amazing, but uh, but he's the same person.

He did he does a good job of not compartmentalizing.

And uh I just encourage you to be the same.

If you're you're different at work, nobody knows what you believe or why you believe it, that's a scary place to be.

When you're afraid of uh of what men think, man, you get in trouble every time.

But if you just wake up wanting to please God, then God's gonna take you further.

Amen.

He's gonna take you right where you need to be.

Amen.

And so um that leads us to my last point, just yield to God's plan for your life.

And instead of reading it, I think I'll just talk about it.

It's found in all of the Gospels, but the one I had in my notes was if you can want to write it down, go back and read it later, it's Matthew 26, 36 through 46.

Uh, and it's Jesus at the Garden of Gethsemane.

And we all know what happened.

We all know that uh Jesus went to pray.

And it's right over the Passover, and it says it stuck out to me that that was his custom to go after the Passover meal, that he would go out by himself to pray.

But this time he brought Peter, James, and John with him.

And he instructed them hey, pray and let lest you be overcome with temptation.

You watch and pray.

That's what Jesus said.

To watch and to pray, those two things.

And he left them, just a stone throw away, in the garden.

And Jesus goes over and he's praying.

Lord, if there's any other way, take this cup from me, but not my will, your will be done.

Only your will.

Not my will, but thy will be done.

And so I think that's a prayer that we don't pray enough.

The prayer of consecration.

Um and so you had lots of things happening that day.

You had lots, you know, Judas was just about to come and betray Jesus with a kiss, right?

We all know the story.

And so what do you have?

You have Peter, James, and John that kept falling asleep.

And Jesus had to go back two or three times, wake them up.

Hey, watch and pray.

I think, you know, did Jesus have mercy on Peter?

He sure did.

But what if he was awake and watching?

What if he wouldn't have grabbed his sword when the soldiers showed up and Peter cuts off the it was the high priest's main assistant.

That was the soldier that he chose to cut off the guy's ear.

Um, his name was Malchus, and uh and Jesus bends down and picks up his ear and slaps it right back on his head.

Why?

Because Peter would have been killed.

But now uh Malchus he had no evidence.

What do you say?

Like, this man cut off my ear.

Wait, you have two ears, what's going on?

And so, no, the evidence was gone.

Why?

Because Jesus had mercy on Peter, and then Peter goes from there and he denies Jesus three times, right?

And so uh, and then he had to join uh Jesus Deniers Anonymous, and it's a 12-step program.

And he said, Hi, I'm Peter.

I it's been 63 days, 42 hours, and however many minutes since I've denied Jesus.

To a 14-year-old girl.

What was going on there?

Like, did she have long fingernails?

Was he afraid that she would like gouge his eyes out or something?

I don't know.

He was afraid of a 14-year-old girl sitting around the fire and denied Jesus and then did it two more times.

And so what happened?

Well, Peter, first of all, uh, when Jesus rose from the dead, he restored Peter, right?

Cooked him fish tacos on the beach.

Peter, do you uh do you love my sheep?

You know, no, Peter, do you love me?

Feed my sheep, and then feed my lambs was the third time.

So so Jesus denied Peter, I mean, Peter denied Jesus three times, and then Jesus restored Peter, and he made him repeat that three times.

That's the same three times.

And then what happened?

Peter was filled on the day of Pentecost in Acts chapter 2, and the Holy Spirit, the Holy Ghost, changed everything.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

Everything about Peter's personality changed.

And Peter truly yielded his life to God.

So you have the prayer of consecration all the way back in that garden where Jesus yielded his life to his father.

And it wasn't just the agony of death that was, you know, that he was, it was, it was the fact that he had never been away from God.

Think about that.

He had never faced being separated from God, but he knew he was going to hell and he was gonna fight the devil, and he was gonna win back the keys of death, hell, and the grave.

Amen.

And he won, amen.

And so uh, but but that was what was weighing on him so much that God sent an angel to encourage him.

Think about that.

He sent an angel.

Has it God ever sent an angel to encourage you?

No, but you've got the Holy Spirit right here on the inside of you, amen.

And so uh let's yield, let's be fully yielded our life, our entire lives to God and uh give him permission.

You know, when we're fully yielded to him, it gives him permission to produce through us what we could never produce on our own.

It takes yielding for him to produce that fruit through you.

Amen.

So you're you're yielding good fruit, you're yielding to the pruning process, and you're yielding your life to God's plan and his purpose and his spirits, his spirit, rather, his desire, his love, his mercy, his ability.

You know, have you yielded your abilities to his ability?

Because his ability is so much greater.

When you take your abilities and you yield them to his abilities, man, God's gonna take you so far, he's gonna do be able to do so much, but it requires yielding.

So all you got to do is yield, right?

Be yielded in total surrender and pray that prayer of consecration not my will, but yours be done.

And that's true worship.

Amen.