I wanna start by sharing with you a couple of stories because there is revival going on around the world. It has been for a long time. Yeah. You know, every Easter, my dad says, and I believe him, that this is the Sunday where the most people around the world ever have ever gathered to hear the name of Jesus, and that's because the gospel is going out to every nation. And you might look around and see what's happening in America and think, you know, oh, man.
It's so dark. You're right. But where the darkness is darkest, the light shines brightest. It is getting darker in places around the world, but the light is shining brighter all around the world. Like, my dad was just in, he's actually on his way.
He's probably in flight. He he did 3 pastors conferences over the last 10 days or so in Liberia, Guinea, and Ghana, or 3 of those nations in West Africa. Over the last year, they've trained 8,550 pastors from 8 different nations on a deeper understanding and revelation of their identity in Christ Jesus, of who Christ is. And when this happens, it multiplies and continue and has been multiplying for the last 10 to 11 years. It's amazing.
But he was telling me a story. He he was in I forget which nation it was, but I think it started reverbing again. I apologize. I'd like, just just cut all the reverb and everything off and make it super dry for me. Okay.
I He was in some nation in Northern Africa or Western Africa like this past over the past 10 days. And I think I I'm gonna have to get the other microphone. There's a reverb effect and I hear my voice twice, it sounds like, and it it's just distracting for me. Okay. So anyway, he's in Western Africa, Northern Africa and they're in between conferences and he's going to the beach and he sees 23 fishermen with their boats and this is like old school boats, old school fishermen, where there's these canoe like things.
You know? So him and his his friends from River of Life Church and and translator, they walk out to the beach and, they start talking to them and he and he puts his foot up. You know? I imagine my dad putting his foot up on the on 1 of their boats and starts talking to him about Peter and what Peter did back in the day, you know, and and sharing the testimony and through that shared the gospel and all 23 of them gave their life to Jesus. I mean, it's amazing.
Like God's doing miraculous things. And then not only that, like, I'm getting to go with Jerry. We're going to Pakistan in March, and there's already been 13,000 people give their life to Jesus. It's already multiplying. We're gonna get to to to equip 1000 leaders who were just baby believers 6 months, a year, 2 months ago.
Now they're leading groups of people and we're gonna get to preach the gospel to 50,000 people, most of which have never heard the gospel before in Pakistan. Do you know? And then we're taking a team in June to Uganda, which is gonna be amazing. But not only that, God's doing amazing things here. I'm just telling you, wake up and realize "wake up and smell the coffee".
Jesus is moving all around the world and I don't wanna miss it here either. Like what I said in the beginning, those of you that didn't get to hear it, I wanna move and I want every single person that comes into this building, every single person that comes into our services to move from **observation to participation**. Observation, watching everybody else do these awesome things and walking away from a Sunday morning service saying, man, that was great to participating and worshiping Jesus together, to participating in the word, taking notes, listening, doing whatever it takes so you can understand walking away and and and memorizing, walking out everything that you heard. And then in your personal walk with Jesus, getting in his word and seeking after him to really know him because you know it's just not a Sunday morning thing, but it's a relationship that impacts every aspect of your life and changes you from the inside out. And when you let that happen, it begins to shift the culture of your family.
It begins to shift the culture of your workplace because of him through you. Beginning to participate, to co labor with him, the great commission. We're on mission together with him. It's not all about the pastor. It's my role to "lay my life down" to equip you to be a minister of the *gospel* in your daily life.
And until you're doing that in your daily life, I haven't done my job good enough. Man, that's why we have a speaking team of 6. Right now I'm going through Corinthians, it's mainly me speaking in Corinthians because that's just the season we're in. But we gotta speak in a team of 6 because we got 6 people that have been faithful, available, and teachable, and have a gift to speak. How dare I stand up here and and and take the spotlight for myself?
It's our role as leaders in the church to lay our lives down, to equip and empower the body of Christ as they're ready to live out everything God's called us to do together. But it takes shifting from observation to participation. Every single 1 of us walking with him and carrying our load that he's asked us to carry, to walk out our part. He's created you for good works, church, and that he's destined you to walk in. And it says works that you should walk in, not that you will.
It's up to our receiving the goodness that he said, hearing him, believing him, and obeying him, and walking in it. Tell you a story from yesterday about here, how God wants to move here. I went to the gym. I go to Largo Rec Center gym. It's just a small gym and it's because it cost me $8 a month.
It's awesome. It's great. And I I a lot of times, I don't know if you've been through the established class that we have. If you haven't, if you want Real Church to be your home church, man, would encourage you go through our established class, which is the first Sunday night of every month because you just gotta go through it once. But you get to see the vision, mission, and values of who we are as a body and get established, see what your next step is.
But at the end of it, we take you through this survey. You know, we we give it to you. It's your homework and you get to do this survey and it it shows you how you best connect with God, how you best hear his voice, how you best, you know, connect with him in relationship. And there's many different ways of doing that, many different personalities. It all is scriptural, but like 1 of the best ways I connect with God is through movement.
Meaning, you know, sometimes I get too distracted if I'm sitting still. So I'll go on a walk, go on a run, go work out, put my headphones in, put some worship music in, and then somehow through working out and listening to worship music, I'm able to focus. And that's a lot of times how I'm preparing the message, how I'm praying for you, praying for our church. So I needed to just get out on Saturday, so I went for an hour or so to the gym, and I'm working out. And as I'm walking in the gym, there's this basketball tournament going on, you know, 15, 16 year olds, and they're awesome.
They're doing great. But I get up to the gym, and 1 of them, apparently his team was done, was up in the gym with his girlfriend and they were doing squats. And as I'm I'm walking in, he's showing her how to do squats, but then, you know, and I'm just gonna get a little graphic here, but but so he put a lot of weight on for her, and then when you spot in squats, lot of times if you spot somebody, you put a hand around the waist. Well, he put both hands around her boobs, and then he squats with her to spot her. Right?
Real church. And so, like, I noticed it and I just kinda like in my heart, I'm like, oh, man. And I kinda roll my eyes, but try to go about my business type of deal. But then he puts more weight, so it's too much weight for her. And he does it again, you know, and they're laughing or whatever and squats and then she goes down because it's too much weight.
He helps her get back up and that thing. But then he's gonna try to do it again with her. I'm like, man, I have to intervene because she's gonna hurt herself, you know, trying to look good, if you will. So I I turn around to her and him and I say, hey hey, man. I said, don't don't let her do that much weight.
You're gonna hurt her. And then I looked to her and I say, hey, you you look like you're an athlete, you know, and maybe have a future in in sports. If you try to do too much weight right now for yourself, you're probably gonna injure yourself right now and that will damage you down the road and you won't be able to do what you wanna do. I said, so just if I were you, I'd take quite a bit of weight off. That's all I said.
They go about their business continuing in the way that they were doing, but with less weight. Praise the Lord. I go about my workout. You know, I'm listening, to some worship music, thinking about the message and everything, and that's that. As I leave, I'm gonna go on a walk because a lot of times when I get done working out, go on a walk about a mile loop and I'm just kinda processed with the Lord because movement, 1 of the ways it helps me to best connect with God, so I'm praying on my walk.
As I go on my walk, I accidentally take a left where I don't normally take a left. And I go to turn around, but I feel the Lord, the Holy Spirit, say keep going. It's okay. And just so you know, if you have a relationship with God, you can hear him that clearly. If you don't now, that's okay.
As as just like a "born again" baby is an infant and learns to distinct distinguish between the notes of their father as they spend time with him, you, as you grow in maturity spending time with your heavenly father, you will learn to hear how he speaks to you by the Holy *Spirit* more and more. It's part of my role to help equip you in that. So I feel led to continue down that turn and take a right, so I did, which it was it was different. I knew it was God because it was different than what was my normal. So I did.
As soon as I took that right, there I see that boy and that girl sitting on a bench all snuggled up and cuddled up. And so as I'm walking by, I know this is God. So I stop. I say, hey, excuse me, sir, ma'am, 15 16. I said, do you do you mind this was yesterday.
I said, do you mind if, I just asked you a question? They said, sure. And I said, what do you think about that Jesus guy? And I say it like that because most people don't know that I'm a pastor, And if they know that I'm a pastor, they put their religious face on. If I ask them all holier than thou, who do you who does thou say that Jesus is?
It it it shuts down and they don't answer truthfully. Guess what? We're "fishers of men". Fishers of people. K?
We gotta learn to fish. So we gotta we gotta fish in a way that's outside of our old box if our old box doesn't work. Amen? I say, who do you guys that Jesus fellow that Jesus guy. And the guy says, I believe in him.
And the girl says, she just kinda smiles at me. And I say, okay. I said, do you know if you don't mind me asking, do you know what it means to be when I say the word born again? And he says, no. And she says, no.
I don't. I said, would you mind if I sit down and tell you? And they say, okay. So I'm asking for their permission. So I sit down and I say, you know, John-3, *Jesus* is with this religious dude named Nicodemus.
And Nicodemus says, hey, we know you're from God because we see the miracles and stuff you do. He said, how do I get there? And Jesus turns to him and says, no 1 can see the kingdom of heaven, can experience the kingdom of heaven unless you've been born again. I said that that's a pretty important statement, isn't it? They're engaged at this point.
I say, okay. And then Jesus goes on like Nicodemus, the religious guy first says, what do you mean? Like crawl back into my mama's womb? I said, that's funny, isn't it? They smile.
I said, no. *Jesus said, you have to be born of water and born of spirit*. Some of you guys have heard me say this a lot, I'm saying it for a reason. You need to learn how to say it. If you don't know how to explain to somebody to be born again, don't shut off just because you've heard it a lot.
Listen even all the more intently and then go tell somebody. Because maybe when we hear it enough, we'll we'll get it in our spirit enough and it'll be so full of our heart that out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Make sense? Because you're a Christian, you're a minister of the gospel. Okay.
So I say I say, no. You don't you don't have to crawl back in your mama's womb. Jesus then said, you have to be born of water and born of spirit. And I look at him and say, both both of you and me, like, mama's water broke. Right?
So we're born of water. Right? They say, yeah. I said, but born of spirit. That's the thing.
Son, you said you believe in Jesus. Even demons believe and tremble. They believe Jesus died and rose again. They were there. They saw it.
But to be born of spirit means not only do you believe that, but you confess Jesus as Lord. You say I'm gonna follow you instead of following me. I'm gonna do what you say over what I feel. And I said I said, that means because you can't say no, and I literally said all of this, you can't say no and Lord in the same sentence. So if Jesus tells you to do something you don't feel like and you say no to him and yes to you, you're still the Lord of your life.
To be born again means I'm confessing Jesus as Lord and I may mess up but I'm gonna fall forward and keep walking with him. I said, do you hear all of that? You get that? They said, yes. I said, do you wanna be born again?
She said, yes. Said, yeah. I said, now look, this is no pressure. This is no no like, I'm not trying to force you into this. Like this is a decision that will impact the rest of your life.
You're not gonna live for you anymore. You're living for Jesus and you're confessing that with your mouth and believing that. Are you sure? Like are you serious? And they both said yes.
I said, well let's pray. I grabbed their hands. They they looked at me I said, no it's not the prayer that saves you, it's the position of the heart, the posture of the heart. And out of that that comes we're confessing with the mouth. Are you serious?
Yes. Grabbed their hands and they said, I said, repeat this after me. Lord Jesus, Lord Jesus, I believe you died for me. I believe you died for me. I believe you rose again.
I believe you rose again, and I've been a sinner. I've been a sinner. I need you to save me from my sin. I ask you to forgive me. I ask you to come into my heart and make me new.
Thank you, Jesus. I choose right now to follow you. Help me to learn what that means in Jesus name. Amen. They said amen.
I looked at them. They were impacted. I I said, you guys don't live here do you? They said, nope. Long ways away.
I said, well, okay. And I wrote down realchurch.us. I said, there's find a *church* where you're from and not a church where the people do the opposite of what they say, but a church where people are participating and following Jesus. And you and you know it's real when you go there. I said find a church, get connected, and get *baptized* Because that's the next step.
Baptism is going under the water. You're saying I'm not who I used to be, I'm not what I said all this on purpose. I'm not who my mama said I was, I'm not who my daddy said I was if they said bad things about me. I'm not what everybody else said. I'm not what I did yesterday or the day before.
No. I am who Jesus says that I am and I'm dead to all that. I'm a "new creation". And I said, when
you come up out of
the water, you're saying I'm now gonna follow Jesus. You are my identity, what you say. I said, so get in the church and get baptized. I said, okay. Gave him the the website, handed it to him and I went to walk away and I stopped.
And I turned back to her and I said, ma'am, I want you to know, both of you, I usually don't walk this direction. I do this all the time and I usually walk that way, but God specifically sent me this way because he had you on his mind and he loves you. And then I said, he thinks that ma'am, I looked her in the eyes, I said, he thinks you're valuable. He "died for you" because you were worth it. Don't ever think you're not.
And then I walked away. You know what? The Holy *Spirit* is the perfect gentleman and the perfect leader. And if what happened yesterday was real, which I believe it was, he's gonna lead them and develop in them *character* and teach them what it looks like to reflect a relationship with Jesus in their daily life. Teach them how to really follow Jesus.
See, if I woulda came at them first and saying, y'all need to stop that. Do you think they woulda listened to me? No. But they experienced the love of Jesus loving them where they were. And then when they call him Lord, he's not gonna leave them where they are.
But he's gonna pull them forward into relationship with him, which means stopping living the way they used to live, but changing their lifestyle to follow him if he's really Lord. Amen? I'm gonna have to change my message now. I'm a share with you a couple of things from first Corinthians, and we're gonna have to go back into 1 Corinthians-3 for a second. And what I share with you today, I didn't get to share with you when we talked about wisdom because we didn't have time.
So I wanna take the time to share this with you now and I want you to meditate on it and think about it. And then I want you to put it into practice and we'll come back next week and I'll share the rest of what I was planning on sharing with you today. Okay? *1 Corinthians-3:18*, just as a review. Do not deceive yourselves.
If any of you think you are wise beyond the standards of this age, you should become fools so that you may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God's sight. As it is written, he catches the wise in their craftiness. And again, the Lord knows the thoughts of the wise are futile. So there's no more boasting about human leaders.
Okay. So like a couple of Sundays ago, if you missed it, I'd encourage you to go back and and listen to the podcast just because we really dove in here. But we talked about wisdom. The bible says that God's thoughts are higher than man's thoughts. Like as far as the heavens are above the earth.
In Psalms it says that. His ways are higher than man's ways as far as the heavens are above the earth and how far is that? We talked about it. 46,000,000,000 light years that way, wherever you're standing on the earth, 46,000,000,000 light years as estimated you'll get to the edge of the heavens, which is amazing. Like that's crazy to think about.
They're probably off a little bit but that's that's a long way. 46,000,000,000 light years, the distance it takes for light to travel in a year. God is infinitely more wise than we are as humans. Would you agree? Yes.
Alright. And so we need to understand his wisdom. What we didn't really talk about much is that in 1 Corinthians-2, now that we've been born again, we have his spirit on the inside of us. It literally says, as a matter of fact, I'll go there and read it. *1 Corinthians-2* chapter I mean verse 16.
It says, for who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him? Right? Who could even understand? Because he's so far above us and so much more wise than we are. But then it says, but we have the **"mind of Christ"**.
What? But we have the mind of Christ. Why? Because his spirit is in us and we're in communion in relationship with us. And like I said before, when my son obeys me, what I tell him to do, even when he doesn't understand, in his obedience, his life is going to demonstrate the wisdom of his father.
When we hear the *Lord* and we believe and obey him even though we don't understand, our life demonstrates the wisdom of our father. A wisdom that is so much higher than the way that normal man thinks. Amen?
You follow me?
Alright. Who's the wisest man that ever lived? *Jesus*. Yes. Before Jesus, who's the wisest man that ever lived?
You guys, Jesus is always the right answer. You're right. King Solomon is the wisest man that ever lived except for Jesus or at least before Jesus. King Solomon, the wisest man that ever lived. If you've never read that, King Solomon is Kings King David's son, a major figure in the old testament.
And I wanna go back to second Chronicles just to just to talk with you a little bit about *wisdom* and explain some pretty what I thought was pretty cool. I understood this this past week and I'm like, wow. I gotta share this with the church. So Solomon, second Corinthian or 2 Chronicles-1, Solomon establishes himself as the king of Israel after his dad, David, died. And so he's going to do a sacrifice to the Lord at the high place where they worship God and so he brings like 1000 animals to sacrifice.
Can you just think about how bloody that is? I mean, just put I'm just trying to get you there. Right? 1000 animals, but that's radically generous and it's amazing. And then on that night, *2 Chronicles-1:7*, that night God appeared to Solomon and said to him, ask for whatever you want me to give you.
That's a blank check right there. Right? Wow. And Solomon answered God, you have shown great kindness to David, my father, and have made me king in his place. Now Lord God, let your promise to my father David be confirmed for you have made me king over a people who are as numerous as the "dust of the earth".
Give me *wisdom* and knowledge that I may lead this people for who is able to govern this great people of yours. So he answered by asking for wisdom and knowledge and that's what we know. Solomon asked for wisdom and then God said to Solomon, since this is your heart's desire, you have not asked for wealth, possessions, or honor, nor for the death of your enemies and since you have not asked for a long life but for wisdom and knowledge to govern my people over whom I've made you king, therefore wisdom and knowledge will be given to you and I will also give you wealth, possessions, and honor such as no king was before you ever had and none after you will ever have. Amazing. Solomon asked for wisdom and knowledge and God gave him wisdom and knowledge which gave him wealth and honor and all this other stuff.
Make sense? And that's what we've always known. Now what's interesting is when you read Luke, you read a perspective that's holy and from God on Jesus' life. But then when you read Mark, you read another perspective that's holy and for God and sometimes it fills in some of the gaps. And then you read Matthew, same story of Jesus and as a perspective, Matthew's perspective by the leading of the Holy Spirit, inspired word of God.
And when you put Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all together, you get a really clear picture of who Jesus is and in some of the stories it fills in the gaps and and and makes things more clear. Make sense? Guess what? It's the same thing with Kings and Chronicles. Sometimes you read Kings, a story, and it says a couple of little different details that fill in the gaps with Kings and Chronicles and makes it more complete.
Not that Chronicles was lying or missing anything, no. It's just 2 different books about the same things. Make sense? So if we go to Kings, we look in 1 Kings-3, we see the same story. In verse 4, it says, the king, this is Solomon, went to Gibeon to offer sacrifices for that was the most important high place and Solomon offered 1000 burnt offerings on that altar.
Sound familiar? At Gibeon, the Lord when we're approaching God, not pride, not thinking that we can get it in our own self, by our own wisdom, we need him. And then here's what he says, your servant is here among the people you have chosen, a great people too numerous to count or number. So give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong. For who is able to govern this great people for yours?
So very interesting. Like, in Chronicles, it says give wisdom and knowledge, but in Kings, it says give a discerning heart. Some of your versions may say an **understanding heart**. And then it says, the Lord was pleased that Solomon had asked for this. So God said to him, since you have asked for this, not for a long life or wealth for yourself, nor have asked for the death of your enemies, but for discernment and administering justice, I will do what you have asked.
I will give you a wise and discerning heart, there's wisdom, so that you will never there will never be anyone like you, nor will there ever be. Moreover, I will give you what you have not asked for, wealth and honor and all of the stuff. So Chronicles, Solomon asked for wisdom. We saw the importance of wisdom in 1 Corinthians-3, like the wisdom of God. Solomon asked for wisdom in Chronicles, but in Kings, we see a more complete picture filling in the gaps where he asked for an understanding heart.
You know, your pastor did a little research, and I went to the, what is the Hebrew word? Because a lot of times the original text and the original language helps us to understand clearly what was trying to be translated. What exactly does an understanding heart mean? The Hebrew word is shama. You say shama?
Shama. On. That's kinda funny. Right? Shama.
Alright. Anyway, the word for an understanding heart, shammah, means to hear intelligently, often with implication of attention, *obedience*. To hear. Solomon asks to be able to hear with implication that he would obey what he heard, and that is wisdom. We will enter into relationship with God and we because of the Holy Spirit in us, now we have the capacity to hear him.
Faith comes by hearing. Faith requires belief and is completed by obedience. Faith and wisdom are the same thing. If I hear, believe, obey, I'm walking by faith, and I'm demonstrating the very wisdom of my heavenly father. My life will demonstrate wisdom.
And when I walk my faith, the world will think I'm foolish because it's it's not even crossed their mind to do something so crazy like that. But if I live by faith and I stand by faith in what he said, my life will display the wisdom of God and people around me will see his glory and his goodness and be drawn into relationship with him. I wanna live a life that demonstrates God's wisdom because I want a hearing and discerning heart. I want to be able to hear the very voice of God in my daily life. That's what You're born again so you can have eternal life.
*John-17:3*, *Jesus* defines eternal life as "knowing God". My sheep know my voice. There's a lot of Christians that's like, well, I've never heard God speak. You can know his voice. Seek after him.
Pursue him. He wants to reveal himself to you. He wants your life to demonstrate his wisdom in every way. Wisdom comes by hearing the 1 who's wise, believing what he said, and obeying it, and putting it into practice. Remember last week, and I wish I had a lot more time, but remember last week, we talked about to the 1 who's given a trust, he must prove faithful.
And in context, that's talking about preachers, and teachers, and leaders in the church, because *James-3* says that not all of you should become teachers because teachers are of God's word are held to a higher standard. I mean, and judged as to not lead the people astray. But in my role, or anybody who gets to teach the word of God, our role in instructing the body of Christ is not to stand above, but it's to serve you with the word and for you to lean in as somebody is revealing the very mysteries of God. And you take that and you you chew on it, you meditate on it, you go home, and you learn and get in the word and allow it to to birth more things in you. So you learn to unlock the mysteries of God, which is just Christ, and growing to know who he is and who he what that means for you in your daily life.
And then before you know it, instead of me revealing to you the mysteries of God, now we're revealing the mysteries of God to 1 another and challenging each other as we walk out our relationship with Jesus together, spurring you on in relationship, amen? But then that means you've been given a trust. He's you're learning to hear the voice of God. He's speaking to you. And the question is, are you going to hear, believe, obey?
Take steps of faith consistently and now have a life that's faithful, meaning not just taking 1 step of faith, but being full of faith. You're doing the same thing that he's told you to do over and over and over until it becomes your lifestyle. And now you're proven trustworthy in that area. You have the character necessary to carry the call in that area so he entrusts you with more revelation and more of his word so that you can hear him and grow faithful in this area too and grow to look more like Jesus. It's the Christian life.
That's why I shared the gospel with those 2 people yesterday, those teenagers, because he's challenged me to get outside of my normal routines over and over and over and hear him in the distractions, and deny myself and what I wanna do in order to love the other people the way that he wants to love them. And in doing so, I get to become the hands and feet of Jesus, and man, it's so fulfilling after I take that step of obedience. I don't wanna be somebody that always makes excuses for what I am and what I've always done and miss out on a life of walking by faith. You know what it takes? It takes repentance.
It takes seeing yourself always, no matter where you get in life, like a little child. Even if you become the king of a great nation like Solomon, seeing yourself in God's eyes, I'm a little child. Yes, I'm your friend, and you're my Lord, but you're my Father too, and I need you to speak to me. I'm seeking after hearing your voice, and I'm not gonna move until I hear you. I'm gonna continue doing what Dolores said, what I heard you say to do last time, and I'm gonna go back and obey and continue doing that until I know what you say to do next.
And until then, I'm standing in what I already know and learning to hear you more clearly because you're my father, and I need to hear you because your word brings me life. And how can you know what He's saying unless you know the principles of His character and His nature from this? This is a a road map, an instruction manual that shows you what it looks like to live a life by the Spirit. And if you don't know the examples, how will you be able to recognize when He tries to show you Himself in your daily life? Man, I want to seek after him and get to know who he is through scripture so I can recognize him in my daily life and follow him.