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Dufresne Ministries Podcast
Growing Up Spiritually | Nancy Dufresne | Holy Ghost Meetings 2024 | Wednesday PM
01:07:55
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Hi, I'm Nancy Dufresne. Welcome to our podcast channel. We know you'll be blessed by today's message. I had a certain sermon come to my heart several days ago, and I go, I'm not quite sure how that's going to work in. And then he God tagged it on Josh, bring me my watch back, brother. That ain't yours. Ain't. Anyway, Thank you. I just. I don't want you forgetful. Don't be touching something like that too long. Hallelujah. But God linked it to something. Starting it off where Pastor Craig in the, I think, Monday morning service, and he was talking about how Elijah there was a spirit and a power of Elijah. John the Baptist came in the same spirit and power of Elijah. What's that? Spirit is he brought out. I loved it. The spirit of faith, right? And power that manifests because the spirit of faith gives place to that. And then he brought out the role that Brother Hagin was what he imparted. And the thing is, these men brought something to us not so we could set it aside when they're not here, but so we would know what to do when they're gone. And we've held to what God put us in the flow, the message he put us in. And people, dad Hagin made this statement. Y' all maybe can help me say it more correctly. Dad Hagin said people will say, well, who is it that got Brother Hagin's anointing? And he would say, those who carriers are the message of the generation. It was not just for a man to pick it up. It's for a generation to pick it up. And I want us to see this, because this is what Pastor Craig was referring to on Monday morning in the service. And he was talking about John the Baptist came in the spirit and power of Elijah. Why? Because of bringing a generation into that we are the generation before Jesus return in the spirit and power of Elijah that precedes his coming. So Luke, chapter one. Luke, chapter one 17. And if you have access to the Amplified Classic, pull that up. And we're going to read this out of the Amplified classic translation. Luke 1:17. Jesus was speaking about John the Baptist and said, he will himself go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah. And now look at this. Why the spirit and power of Elijah came on him to turn back the hearts of the fathers to the children and the disobedient and incredulous and unpersuadable. Let me tell you, if you're a faith person, you're persuadable by the Word. You're quick to be persuaded. You're easy to persuade. You're not critical of the Word. When you're a faith person, you're not critical to critically evaluate. But once you see it's the Word, you are so easy to be persuaded. That is the characteristic of a faith person. Not gullible by everything that comes, but persuaded easily by the Word. So it says unpersuadable to turn the unpersuadable. Look at this. The disobedient, the incredulous and the unpersuadable. To turn to what? To the wisdom of the upright, which is the knowledge and holy love of the will of God. Loving the will of God. Loving the will of God. If we treat the will of God as optional in our life, we don't love it as we ought. When we love the will of God, that's all we're wanting to fulfill is his will. I mean, loving it as we ought. And so John the Baptist came in the spirit and power of Elijah also. Let's go reading further. In order to to make ready for the Lord a people perfectly prepared in spirit, adjusted and disposed and placed in the right moral state. This is part of what the people who are helping bring back, ushering the coming of Jesus. This is the description of these people. A generation whose hearts are turned back is described here. In other words, it matters how we live. It matters that we're living clean. You understand me? Living clean. To be ready for the Lord. Now notice he said this to make ready. To make ready for the Lord. To be ready for the Lord to use us in the era. In this era, the following has to be in place. Let me make the list for you. Perfectly prepared in our spirits. We just read it. Number one. Perfectly prepared in our spirits. Number two Adjusted. The definition for the word adjusted means having made needed adjustments and everyone needs different adjustments. What is the Holy Ghost dealing with you about? Adjusting. What's he dealing with you about? Changing. Because to be part of this company, you have to address that. The next word is to be disposed. The definition of this is to put in a particular or proper order or arrangement. To adjust by arranging the parts. To put in a particular or suitable place to make fit, ready and prepared. So, meaning this, we can't have things out of order and say, I'm ready to run with God's plan. Can't do it. Things have to be in their proper place. My husband used to say this. When God brings you into another phase of your ministry or what you're called to, He Said, you better have everything bolted down because what's not bolted down is going to come apart in that transition time. And that's why some people fall away from your life because they weren't bolted down with the foundation of the Word under them. Listen, when I married my husband, I was 22 years old, raised in a denominational church, precious people. But we weren't taught the things that I married into. My husband had been in the ministry already over 15 years. He already had a voice in the body of Christ. There was 20 years difference between the two of us. He was my Bible school. I'd only been saved and filled with the Holy Ghost a short amount of time when I met him and married. Two weeks after marrying him, we were down in Florida preaching. And one night we were in the hotel room. He was asleep. I was asleep. And I was awakened because five times Satan appeared to me that night in that hotel room. You think about put on your big boy pants to someone who did not. I didn't know how to use. I didn't know. Use the name of Jesus. I didn't know what. I didn't know what to do in the face of that. We go to, and I won't even tell all that happened that night with that. But we go to a service that following night. Someone else is ministering in the camp meeting. Ed's one of the guest speakers, but someone else was ministering that night. They called me out and said, satan tried to kill you. And I didn't tell Ed about it because I thought he's going to think I'm crazy. I think I'm crazy. I didn't understand what was happening. And so this minister said, satan tried to kill you. And under my breath I go, yeah, last night, what was that? I came into a flow that I got tested at his level. Not my level. What I joined with, I got tested at that level. That's why you don't marry into something you're not anointed to marry into. Amen. You don't take something to yourself you're not grace to and decide I'm going to walk in an office you're not called to. And why do I say that? Because that transition time in my life, all hell broke loose against me. And it wasn't just that one event. People have no idea what came against me. I mean, for a year and a half solid, and part of the help of that, I never told my husband I'm that way. You put me on a roller coaster. I go silent. You know, most people Start screaming. Not me. Shh. It all goes inward, inward. I remember I had Stephen. Let's talk about Stephen. Come on. You had to be there this morning. 36 hours of labor, 11 hours of hard labor. No meds. No all natural. Not by choice. I'm not a granola. Not choice. Not choice. I wasn't trying to prove womanhood or anything, but I found out once I. I got admitted there, they didn't give epidurals except to people going, having the C section. And the thing is, is because I was laying on that bed. Cause I had told them, I think I'm getting me a shot. You know, you approach that and you go, I'm gonna get me a shot. And you're thinking about the shot. And then they tell you, no shot. What do you mean, no shot? Somebody's gonna get shot. You know, because I wasn't mentally prepared for no shot. And the doctor pulled Ed aside and, you know, he said, I know she wants an epidural, but we're not gonna give her one. She's doing too well. Now, listen. So says the man. That's the language of a man. When a woman's on a labor, she's doing well. The reason he said that was because when I get under pressure, I go silent. I go, no sound. I don't make a sound. I'm that way when I'm attacked. No sound. I'm talking about talking it out. I don't run around. I don't give out a sound. Do this. I go. I go inward. I just go inward. I go silent. My husband didn't know things I was going through. I didn't tell him. And maybe I should have or could have, but God helped me through. And I'm talking about early on when we got married, because it was such a big transition time, and we'd only been married a little while. And we were in the back room at Brother Hagin meeting, and different ministers were there. And that was the first night I met Norville Hayes. He was so cute. He was introduced to me, and he just looked at me like this, you know? And then ed's right here, and he said, ed, can I kiss her? Let me kiss her, Ed. Let me kiss her. He said, no, Norva, you're not kissing my wife. And I'm going, So cute. He was just. He was cute. And he said to Ed, he said, I'm staying at the same hotel. Will you drive me back? Because he had come with somebody else to the meeting. And Ed said, yes, yeah, sure. Absolutely. So it was only a 10 minute drive to the hotel from where we were at. But he got in that car and by the spirit of God, he began answering for me what the devil had been, if I could say this, trying to bombard, take my life into a hole for a year and a half. And that man sat in that car and for the next 45 minutes turned to me and talked to me and defused every argument of the enemy. God always put my help. As long as you're in a place where God is moving, you can hear your help. When you're faced with something, get where God's talking. Primarily that should be your local church. If you don't have a local church, that's your problem. And, and in those times of transition. But we went through many transitions. I tell you what, everything that wasn't bolted down, it came loose. And you know what it is when you go to take off on the plane, you can carry all your stuff on a commercial flight, you can have your pretty bag, your nice bag or your junk bag, whatever you got, and you throw it at your feet. And they come around, uh, you got to get that out of there. That's got to be, that's got to be under here. Or you put it up and make sure. And they come around. Even though somebody has closed that top cabinet, they come around and they check that. Why? Because it take off. No time to put anything back. That's not where it ought to be. That's what this is talking about. Everything in place where it should be. Because in the last days era, there's devils that are going to poke on everything that's not in place. Know this, the devil can only work against you through the most carnal one around you. That's why as ministers you can't have carnal people around you. I'm talking about working closely to you. Because they will be an access that the enemy will work through to try to trouble your office, trouble your staff, trouble your congregation. So what's that mean? We all have to grow up so that we don't become a door that the enemy works through and gains entrance through. That doesn't mean we're all mature, but we all should be growing. We should all be growing. And then the next thing that it says Here in Luke 1:17, it says here, preparing those who are prepared in spirit, adjusted and disposed and placed in the right moral state. Placed in the right moral state. Turn with me if you would. Second Peter, chapter one. Two Peter, chapter one, Verse two, and I'll read through this quickly. Second Peter, chapter one, verse two. Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God. If you're troubled and harassed in your mind, what is it you don't know? You need to know more. You need to know more about who you are in Christ, the victory that is yours. Grace and peace are multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, who you are in him. Verse 3. According as his divine power has given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue of whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises, that by these you might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that's in the world through lust. And beside this, look at this next phrase. Giving all diligence. Add to your faith. Virtue. Add to your faith. Add to your faith. Add to your faith. We have the spirit of faith and we have been given a measure of the God kind of faith. It's up to us to nurture it, feed it, cause it to grow. But we have to add something to our faith. It says, and add to your faith, virtue. And to virtue add knowledge. And to knowledge add temperance. And to temperance add patience. And to patience, godliness. And to godliness. What's godliness? Godlikeness, verse 7. And to godliness, brotherly kindness. And to brotherly kindness, charity. Notice this. He brought brotherly kindness and charity as two different things. Well, charity is really love. It's to be regretted that the King James calls it charity. But they think they're helping us because charity means love in action. But it's human love and action, it's charity. We have divine love in action. We're not operating in living. We're redeemed from living by human love. Because it's not enough. It doesn't have the stuff to finish. But divine love does. So here, he broke out here. The difference between brotherly kindness and charity or divine love, why did he break them out? Because it matters that you're walking in love. And especially with the brethren. Especially with the brethren. Anybody who causes problems in the local church, they're headed for big trouble. Big trouble. Anyone who speaks and brings damaging words against the body of Christ, they're in for big trouble. Get back into safety. Don't hurt the body of Christ. Don't hurt the body you're a part of. Amen. So he says he breaks these out, especially brotherly kindness. But I want to go back and focus on what it says in verse 5 and beside this giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue. Virtue. In other places, the word virtue means means power. But in this place, it's not the word translated power. It's translated moral excellence. Add to your faith moral excellence. Notice it doesn't even list love next to this word faith. It bumps moral excellence right up next to faith. That's the closest thing that is going to have to be in place if your faith is going to work. We can't live any way we want and think that we're going to come up and get in a heat and line and have have the power of God. Why? Because your faith is going to be affected by your life. How you live, who you hang out with, what you watch, where you go, conversations you have, people you allow to speak into your life. What you decide to enjoy is going to affect your faith. I'm talking to you about how to keep what you receive tonight. Amen. To be a faith person and we say we're faith people. Why? Because faith pleases God. We say we're faith people. Then we also have to say I'm a morally excellent person. And just because the world's confused doesn't mean you get to be confused. Bless their heart. The world doesn't know anything but to be confused. I don't fault them for being confused. But don't let the spirit of the world get in the church. The only way it can get in is if you drop down on moral excellence. The standard of the world always tries to get into the church. How does it get in? Through carnal people. People that are not renewing their minds. People that are not doing the Word. And it brings all kinds of troubles into the body of Christ. We have a standard. What's our standard? Jesus himself. Jesus himself. Well, I can never be like him. You're in him. He's in you. To empower you to be as he would have you be. Amen. And I don't care what's popular or not popular. You mock morality and you're going to suffer in this life and the next life. If you mock morality, you make light of morality. You're going to suffer. Amen. Praise the Lord. Go with me now to First Peter, chapter 2:24. We know this verse, First Peter 2:24. It's a foundational healing verse, isn't it? By whose stripes ye were healed. We love First Peter 2:24. We should love First Peter 2:24. But let's back up in that verse, First Peter 2:24. Who his own self bare our Sins in his own body on the tree. That we being dead to sins, we being dead to sins. We being dead to sin. I'm dead to the power of sin. It doesn't boss me around anymore. It's not doing my thinking for me. Anything that the body would try to want, that is sin. It has no more power over me. And I tell it, you're not bossing me around anymore. You used to boss around the old man, the new man. You're not bossing around. No. Any addiction, any habit, anything that troubles you, whether it's porno, whether it's drugs, whether it's alcohol, whatever it is that tries to trouble your flesh, boss it. God, Jesus has made you master. Be master. It has no more power over you. You say, well, it doesn't feel that way. Doesn't matter what you feel. You stand up and you say, you got no power over me. You talk to it. You say, you got no power over me. His own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree. That we being dead to sin. I'm dead to that thing. Dead to it. It says over In Romans, chapter 12, verse 2, be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind. What's that mean? If Christians don't do something with their thought life, their life is going to look like the unsaved man. But it says in verse one, it talks about, offer your bodies. Present your bodies to God. A living sacrifice. Present it to God. How do you present your body to God? Don't present it to sin. Present it to God. Don't present it to sin. Don't present it to wrongdoing. Don't let your body cooperate with wrongdoing. You say, I can't help it. Yes, you can. You're dead to that thing. You have to tell it. I'm dead to you. You're not wrecking my life anymore. Amen. We are dead to sin. Look at this. Should live. Should live. There's a way we should live. We should live under righteousness. We are the righteousness of God. Now we should be living that way. Come on. We're not righteous because we do everything right. We're righteous because Jesus did everything right and credited us as though we're the ones who did it right. And because we are now right with him, not by our works, now we can live like one who is right with him. That means we have a standard. Not going there anymore. I'm not listening to that mess anymore. I'm not watching that. I'm not going to choose to enjoy what my buddies used to enjoy. Many of you need to find new buddies so you can live unto righteousness. Why does that matter? The next phrase. By whose stripes ye were healed. Notice this. Before he mentions healing, he mentions how you should live when people don't live as they should. What belonged to them in Christ. The devil has permission to steal from them when they don't live as they should. How should we live? Doers of the Word. Doers of the Word. Doers of the Word. Are we earning our healing? No, healing belongs to us. But we're keeping our healing from being stolen by how we live. Why? That's part of this generation who comes in the spirit and the power of Elijah. That's right. What do you mean by that? Well, we read it. Yeah. Morally adjusted. Right? Moral state. Praise the Lord. We don't play around here. We don't play. We don't play. Anyone can come here and get free. Anyone cannot come here and decide they're going to bring the wrong flow on purpose and want us to accept that. I don't put up with strife. I don't put up with any. We don't put up with anything we don't have. We've never had a church split in over 30 years. Why? Because the Holy Ghost keeps us in front of it. We teach the people there's a higher flow to live in. You don't have to live that way. We don't threaten them. We show them what God has provided for them. But we just don't put up with certain things. Don't you operate your home that way? You don't put up with certain things. What you put up with will get in. Amen. And you have to say, in my life, there are certain things I'm not putting up with anymore. And that is love. People have a wrong idea of what the love let me get off on. Well, I'm walking in love. Love is not permissive toward wrongdoing. God, who is love? When Satan, when sin was found in him, Love rose up and said, you're done, and kicked him out. Jesus said, I beheld Satan fall as lightning. God dealt with him. Love dealt with him so quick. You're not violating my place. Don't call it love when you're being permissive toward people who don't want to be right. I'm talking about in the authority of your own home, in the authority of your local church. I love people. They can come here and get free. And I don't expect people to walk Free from bad habits overnight. I don't expect that by any means, but if you'll show me you're hungry, we'll walk with you every step of the way to walk you into all that God's made yours. But we will not help you live lower than what God has for you, because that's what's tearing up your life to begin with. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Now turn with me. Two Peter, chapter three. Second Peter, chapter three. In verse 18, Second Peter, chapter three, verse 18, Peter writes, and he says, but grow in grace and grow in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Listen, your church needs to be a growing place. If the people stay the same, you're not doing it right. People need to grow up spiritually. They need to develop. Pastors need to put an expectation on the people to develop. My mother put an expectation on us for kids. You're not doing that. You're not going that way. I don't care what the neighbor kids do. You're not doing that. She put an expectation on us in that home for us to meet that. Pastors need to let people know what the word expects of them so they'll come up to it. Amen. Grow in grace. Peter said, grow in grace. This is what pastors need to say. We're growing in grace around here. You say, well, what does it mean to grow in grace? Well, let me just state something to you. Read to you what Dakes said of this phrase, grow in grace. He said, the Christian life is a process of growth. Every grace and every blessing of the gospel is in seed form and is implanted in the newborn child of God. It's in you, but it's in seed forms. If these seeds are watered from heaven, what's that mean? Time with God. Time in his presence. If these seeds are watered from heaven and cared for by them walking in the light of the Word, they will grow to full maturity. What's this mean? Don't put up with not growing. Don't be okay with any part of your life. You're not growing up. Spirit, spiritually, if you look the same as you did last year, there's something more offered you pay attention. Is my marriage getting sweeter? Are my finances increasing? Is my peace growing? Is my conversation becoming more appropriate? Are my words more measured? Am I watching to make sure that things in my life are a blessing to people? Don't put up with being the way we were. Amen. Amen. So what's this say when Peter is saying, grow in grace? He said Grow up spiritually. Grow up spiritually. Grow up spiritually. You know, if we have children, we have a child, and they don't seem to be making proper growth processes. We go, something's wrong. We take them to the doctor, we make appointments and stuff. They're not seeming to develop the right way because we know that's not appropriate, even over natural things. How much more spiritually? If your marriage isn't getting better, you need to say, I need help. And how do I need help? I need to quit just saying amen to the Word and do it. Your spiritual development is up to you, not God. The Holy Ghost will help you in that process, but he can only grow at the rate you'll go with him. You can only grow at the rate that you'll go with him in Amen. I want to touch on, because this is the sermon that kept coming to me, and I'm just gonna touch on it briefly, is a little mini book by Kenneth Hagin called Growing in Grace. If you don't have it, get it. It's one you pull out and read every month to give yourself a divine checkup. And he lists this. You know, you see a mini book and sometimes you think the message in it is, light is small and this thing is loaded. Pastors, I'd encourage you to get hold of it and preach it to your people. But Brother Hagin did not come up with this list on his own. There was a man around the turn of the 19th century that was a preacher and he wrote these things in his Bible. And Brother Hagin saw that list and took it and made a mini book out of it. And he listed that there are five things that will hinder us growing up spiritually. Five things that hold us back, hold us into carnality, hold us into babyhood stage that we're not growing. And we need to make sure that we are checking off these things in our life, that we're not allowing these things to hinder our growing up. Can I tell you what growing up? Staying spiritually young means? This. You're getting beat up in life. That's what that means. Your mind is getting beat up. Your finances are getting beat up. Your home is getting beat up, your marriage is getting beat up. Now, I know this opposition comes to everyone. I'm not saying just because opposition comes, you're doing it wrong. But I'm saying as we're growing, we grow in skill, over mastery, over those things, things that oppose us, and they don't tear our life up. Jesus made us the head not the tail. We are not the cleanup crew for what the devil's doing in our life. Going around running up, cleaning up that mess and cleaning up this mess. He doesn't make messes in my life. Amen. Why? We're growing in grace. We're growing up spiritually. So there are five things that are hindrances to our growth in grace. Growing up spiritually. I'll give all five, and then I'll just touch on them briefly. Number one, lightness. Number two, looseness. Number three, laziness. Number four, loquacity. There's your word for the day. Loquacity. What's loquacity? Means Talk too much. Overspeaking. Number five, like other people. Number one. Like lightness, looseness, laziness. Loquacity. Like other people. These are the things that will hinder us from going further into what God has for us. Now let me touch on them real briefly. If you'll notice, three of those five have to do with the mouth. We got homework with our mouth. Amen. This first hindrance, that of likeness. Likeness is the flow of the world. What's it mean? They lack substance. I mean, when they get up so they can save a tree that day. I'm just saying they don't have a purpose that they're getting up for. We have a purpose. Let's not live like we're not. We don't have a worthy purpose to our life. We're just floating through life, being mindless, living light. I'm not saying living is the light of the world, but living in lightness. And that will try to get into the church to where people aren't sober about their responsibilities. The story of the prodigal son. There's two problems in that. That man had two problems in his family. His oldest son and his youngest son. Two problems. The prodigal son. All he wanted to do was enjoy the privileges of being a son. Right? He didn't want to take his responsibility of sonship, the elder son. All he did was focus on the responsibilities. And he. He had no joy in his household. He had no joy in that. He got to be with his father. He didn't enjoy the privileges. What's likeness? Is all people want is. They want the privileged side. They don't want the responsibility side. It's not appropriate to be part of a local church and not serving. Not appropriate. Don't be locked toward the responsibilities in that local church. I mean, growing up in your household, didn't that work? You have four kids and one of them's getting up and doing work and. Or three of them getting up and doing work, and one is just sitting there, you know, going like this. You know what the other three do? Take them outside and beat them up a little bit. You're not doing that. I'm not picking up your junk. Right. You don't put up with it in a home. The church is a family. The church is a family. Amen. We're not light toward the responsibilities of being a family member in the body of Christ. Amen. Another thing that's going to play into holding us light and lightness, which will be spiritual immaturity. Feeding on the things of the world will make you more worldly rather than more godly. Many spend so much time on recreation, social media and games and things that it's leaving their spirits emaciated. They're not feeding themselves. They're not feeding themselves or they're coasting around. I just. Can I tell you, one of the reasons we have an anointing in this church is because we don't mingle a bunch of flows. I'm not against. Listen, I am not against. I love everyone that God has placed in the body. I love. I tell you, I so value and appreciate every member of the body. I value and appreciate every local church. But I know where I fit. I stay where I fit. It's not a dishonor to the other places. You know what's a dishonor? Dishonor is when the hand gets up and says, you know what? I think I'll be on the knee today. No, you won't. You're going to mess up everything. Right? You know where you fit. You know where you fit, and you stay where you fit. That's called being sober. About our responsibilities in the body of Christ. Because when we're not where we fit, we cause problems. Amen. Amen. So the thing is that we need to make sure we're feeding our spirits instead of just feeding the natural side. This generation has an unusual challenge. You know, when I was growing up. Let's just say when I was growing up to go to places of ill repute, you had to risk being seen to go into that place. And the. The threat of being seen kept you out of those places. Today they can pop it into your bedroom and nobody knows. Jesus knows. And at some point, Jesus has to be enough to stop you from going to those places you shouldn't be going to. I tell you what, you play, you play and you get pulled without intending to get pulled. Smith Wigglesworth made this statement he said, the more I'm with the world, the more I become like the world. The more I'm in the word, the more I become like God. Amen. Watch your spiritual diet. Do not get on the Internet and click on people who preach against what God has put you in. The flow. God has put you in. Not everyone will understand it, but they're not going to talk me out of where I know God talks. There have been many people who have torn up their marriages and torn up their homes because they clicked on something online of listening to criticism of the place God had for them to feed from. I won't touch. I won't mess with that stuff. How do you know where to feed? Well, where'd God put you? Feed on your pastor's materials. Feed on where God told you to be. Amen. And I would say this, my husband, I would say this. We knew God had us hooked up to dad Hagin. You talk against dad Hagin, I'm not going to get offended at you, but I recognize you just broke fellowship with me. I didn't break fellowship with you. You broke fellowship with me. Because I recognize where God told me to be. And I will not listen to somebody crying, criticize the place that feeds my life. I won't do it. Then there are fighting words. And that is the love of God protecting what God put in my life. Amen. Don't ever sit and listen to somebody criticize your pastor. You know God put you there. Don't you ever. And you say, well, I don't want to. I don't want to. You know, I don't want to be divisive. They broke the law of fellowship when they spoke against who God connected you. They broke the fellowship. And I have seen this. Let me help you. Let me just help you. Pastor, let me tell you what people who do, when they get disgruntled in a local church, they want to leave. And then they want to pull as many with them as they can so that they look right and they're leaving. And so they'll try to go and they'll try to get into people's houses and have dinner on Friday night and have dinner on Listen. And I had somebody that years ago, they said, pastor Nancy, they've left the church. This couple had left the church. And they were going around and telling everybody, this is our last Sunday. Well, just go, you know, just go, just go. But they were announcing it. Why? Because they wanted to do as much damage as they could on the way out. So I had somebody that came to me. And they said, pastor Nancy, we don't know what to do because we know they're leaving the church, but they're asking us to come over for dinner. We don't want to act like we're not walking in love, but we thought maybe we could help bring them back. And I said, you know something? If a sheep goes after a lost sheep, now you've got two lost sheep. It's only the shepherd anointed to go after lost sheep. Sheep are not anointed to go after lost sheep because they'll get sucked off course with the lost sheep. It's the shepherd that goes and finds the lost sheep. And sometimes I say they need to keep going. If I'm not going after them, don't you go after them and bring them back. Because they're caught, you don't know what kind of damage they're doing in the body. Amen. This is called right thinking, people. This is called walking in love with the place God put my life, where my life gets fed, my family gets healed. Here my answers for my life come. I'm not going to let somebody who doesn't honor where God put me. That's fine. Go where you want. But you're not. You're not affecting my children and talking against my pastor to my children. That's not happening because you broke the law of fellowship. And I didn't walk away from you, your fellowship. You did. It's not my job to try to stay in fellowship with someone who keeps breaking the law of fellowship. There's laws that govern this. Praise the Lord. I didn't mean. That's not on here. I'm just trying to help pastors because pastors end up beating themselves up for people leaving. I love what my husband says. Somebody came up to him and says, I could do a better job than you, pastor. And Ed said, well, the only thing is you're just not called. And he said, well, I'm leaving church. Ed said, good, we need your seat. Instead of, what did I do wrong? Don't question your call because someone doesn't know where to stay. Praise the Lord. Watch your spiritual diet. Don't just feed on everything out there. And, I mean, it's so easy to pop into. It will confuse you. It will just know who God told you to be hooked up with. It's not. That's not excluding people. It's being accurate. You know, whenever you go home at the end of a work day and you drive home, you pass a lot of houses to get to your yours. And you're not being rude to all those houses. That's just not your house. We're going to think you're crazy if you stop off at every house on the way home. What's the matter with you? Don't you know where you live? I tell you what. Spiritually, God has put you to live somewhere. You better know where he put you to live and stay there. Don't be liked toward that. It'll hinder your spirit spiritual growth. Amen. Praise the Lord. Another thing. When we talk about lightness, what about this? What kind of music you listen to that will open up the way for God to move or for wrong things to come in? What about this? What you read, what you watch, what you call entertainment. Amen. Praise the Lord. What about this lightness and conversation? Everything's a joke. Everything's a joke. Everything's a joke. I mean, there comes a time when at some time, you can't turn everything into a stage of performance just so you can be the 4 show. I believe in having a good time. Listen, I take the Rameses with me. I take different ones with me. You know why they come with me? They fun. If they're no fun, they can't go. Why? Because you're dealing with all kinds of things. And I need fun people. Why? Because fun people are faith people. If you're not having fun, you're not in faith yet. We have fun, but you have to know there's a line that's going to hold you into carnality. There's a line that you're not going to minister spirituality to people. People. You're going to help them be more and more carnal and draw them into the natural more and more. Let's. First Timothy, chapter six. Are you okay? You want to get back, or do you want to get back to the healing part of the flow? This is how to keep your healing. You can't take your healing to any old place. You have to treat your healing right. First Timothy, chapter six, verse 20. And I'm going to read out of the amplified classic translation. First Timothy, chapter 6, verse 20. Guard and keep the deposit entrusted to you. Paul's telling Timothy, a young minister, turn away from the irreverent babble and godless chatter with the vain and empty and worldly phrases. There needs to be a distinction between the words we use and the world uses, the way we talk and the way the world talks. Amen. And I'll just read Ephesians 5:4, the Amplified classic. Let there be no filthiness. Obscenity, indecency, nor foolish and sinful, silly and corrupt talk, nor coarse jesting, which are not fitting or becoming, but instead voice your thankfulness to God. What's he saying? Turn a different direction with your mouth. Amen. First Corinthians 13, verse 11, the Amplified Classic. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. Now I become a man. I'm done with childish ways and I put them aside. There are some things that if we're going to go further, we have to put aside. Out of the way we talk, the way we communicate, we put it aside. That doesn't mean don't be joyful. It doesn't mean don't have a good time. It doesn't mean be approved. My gosh. I wouldn't want to be around you. But I'm talking about know the line, know where the line is. Amen. Number two. That was lightness number two. And this is really plays into this second one. Looseness. Looseness means without order and unrestrained in behavior. We can't let our bodies inflict and think that God's going to be able to use us the way he wants. We have to watch over ourselves in thought. We have to watch over ourselves in our speech, in our behavior. We're not to be loose in our thought life. Sin did not begin in an act, it began in the thought life. Somebody thought about it for a good long time before they, before they acted on it. If they would have not been loose in their thought life, could not have played out in their life. You have to discipline your thought life. It's a full time job to pay attention. But if you'll start doing that, it becomes easier and easier and easier. Amen. We're responsible for our own thought lives. We're responsible. Amen. Can I just tell you this? When your mind tries to trouble you, when your mind tries to take you the wrong direction to speak, start praising God. Just start praising God. Why? It'll bring your attention to the right thing. Get your attention and your thoughts out of the wrong place. Amen. If we are loose in our thinking, will we be loose in how we speak to others? It's going to show up in the way we speak. It's going to show up in the way we talk to others. Know this. If someone will talk to you about someone, think somebody can come and talk bad about somebody to you that's unsafe. What? Let them know you're not doing that around here? You bet. And you need to watch it in your own homes, spouses, you need to check each other out. Years and years ago, years and years ago, I pulled up, God just dealt with me about letting a certain employee go. And I said, God, they're a great blessing. I love working with them. I don't understand that. He said his wife speaks against his congregation, against leadership, and he won't tell her to stop in his own home. He's not safe. That's right. That's right. You understand that. You don't control how somebody talks. But Joshua said, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. He's saying, there are certain things that aren't going to go on in my house. House. There are certain ways and ways of talking. You're not talking my house. Amen. I had somebody come up to Grant. He was probably about 10 years old. And they said. They came up in the back hall and said, oh, isn't it rough being a preacher's kid? I stopped that mess right there. It's not rough being a preacher's kid. What's rough is being carnal. Now, that's what's rough. And if it was rough being a preacher's kid, it's because they were carnal while they were being a preacher's kid. Being a preacher's kid is an honor. To live with those who teach in the body of Christ. That's an honor. You're not putting that mess in my children just because you think wrong about ministry. Don't pump that into mind. The ministry's done nothing but bless my family. The anointing of God's done nothing but bless my family. It's people with unrenewed minds who have caused the problems, not the ministry. People with unrenewed minds, unrestrained flesh. And don't you talk that mess in my children. They will not hate the place we're born for. People need to straighten out their thinking and say, well, the ministry ruined my family. No, ministry didn't. Wrong thinking ruined it. Wrong thinking, not renewing the mind, not guarding the thought life. Amen. Letting other people do your thinking for you, telling you something wrong and you believe in it. Well, praise the Lord. I really do love you. Listen, your only safety is in growing up. Yeah. Yeah. We are not to be loose. What about this? Being loose in our habits will hurt us. Just our habits, our daily habits will hinder our spiritual growth. What about looseness in life? And when I talk about looseness in life is looseness toward the opposite sex. Our staff and me, we're not allowed to be alone with the opposite sex. Not going to happen. We got glass windows on everyone's offices. Why don't you trust me? No, I don't trust the devil. I mean, if I'd have to go have a meeting with somebody, a man, I'd take somebody with me. Nobody's going to sit in there and accuse me of something I didn't do. It matters to me how things look. Well, people shouldn't judge by look. Well, the Bible says that you better make sure that you're showing the right thing. Amen. You better protect that because nobody else is going to. Amen. Off color jokes, off color ways of talking to the opposite sex. You got no business with that. You're playing with something, you're playing with something. And if you call it enjoyment, you got some hard life ahead of you and doesn't need to be hard. What about this looseness, living on the edge of carnality? I heard a minister made a statement, well, you know, I can drink alcohol and stuff because I know how to do it without getting drunk. You know, my thing is the problem with drinking alcohol. Let me tell you what, it turns you into a slave. It cost Jesus everything to free you. I don't put myself around things that can enslave me when it costs him everything to free me. That's the danger of it. It's not that it's alcohol. It's anything that, anything that enslaves, anything that turns you back into a slave. And when I heard that a minister said that, you know, I can drink. I know how to do that without getting drunk. The only thing is, the more you walk with God, the further away you want to get from the line of carnality, not the closer you can get to it without stepping over. I want to get so far away from anything that's unlike him. Praise the Lord. Spiritual people stay away from things. They just stay away from things. Third thing, laziness. We've done lightness, looseness, laziness. And you know, you can develop this pastors, you can develop this in your own direction of all the things how God would give you to help your people. Laziness. It's possible for some people to be too lazy to grow up spiritually. Too lazy. They don't give any effort or time to feeding on the word and praying. And it's not by works. But I tell you what, you have to put forth effort to educate yourself just academically. As a child, remember, there was such effort you had to put forth, get up get dressed, get some, you know, get some breakfast, get to the school bus, get to school. I mean, I hated it, but I mean, I did it. You did it. We put forth effort. You can't be lazy and arrive at what God has for you. You have to keep your flesh under. You have to take charge of your flesh because your flesh will hold you in carnality if you're following your flesh. Amen. Paul said this in First Corinthians, chapter 9, verse 27. He says, But I keep under my body. This great apostle of God had to keep his body under. Why? His body wanted to do things. He said, you're not ruining my life. A body left unchecked is a life off course. Amen. Praise the Lord. Not only this laziness, not going to be too lazy to serve in the local church. Do our part, do our part in the body of Christ. Amen. The fourth, and we're just touching on these briefly, the fourth thing. Loquacity. Talkative people who just. My mother used to say it to us kids all the time, quit rattling. Just quit rattling. You're saying it and it doesn't mean anything. You're just rattling. Just because mother said, just because there's silence doesn't mean that's your invitation. She'd say, just shut up. Just shut up. When you got four. I remember my mother would. Because she would raise us basically, you know, single handed. My dad was a farmer. He was gone all the time. And mother would just say, I got to get out of this house. I got to get out of this house. I'm going to go crazy in this house. We go, what's up with her? I don't know what her deal is, but mother would quit rattling. You're just saying something now. And another thing that happens with rattling. I remember getting in the car when I was in junior high and I'd say something about, oh, that girl or that girl. Mother said, shut up. She said that complaining, talking about people is a bad habit. You're not doing that. What is that? Loquacity? Talking too much. That's right. Complaining about this, complaining about that, complaining about it. That's the one thing. Spiritual people are not complainers. You can't have faith and complaint in your mouth at the same time. God said something to me a long time ago. He said, rid your life of all complaint. It doesn't mean everything's going to be the way I want it to. But you got no business complaining about it because faith has a way of talking and it's not with complaint in its mouth. That loquacity. Talking too much. Well, I got a right to my opinion. Oh, geez. Overly opinionated people will stay carnal. When we got redeemed, we got redeemed from having to have an opinion. You know what an opinion is? It's evident you have no authority. Because when you're in charge, it's not an opinion, it's a decision. We have whole networks dedicated to opinions. And that's all that's on the network is opinions. What's that mean? They got no authority and it's a bad habit to fall into freely. Overly opinionated. It'll keep it. Until you learn that another man's business is not your own, you'll never be spiritual. Praise the Lord. Yes. Amen. Yes. Amen. Hallelujah. Know this. We have to have divine help with this mouth. We have to have divine help with this mouth. Every single one of us. Every single one of us. Every single one of us. Psalm 141, verse 3. Yes, this is a healing service. Yes, it is. Psalm 141, verse 3. Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth. Keep the door of my lips. Now notice this. He can set a watch over your mouth, but if you're going to sneak out past the watch, he can't help it. Come on. Come on. When you know what the word says and you're going to say it anyway, he said a watch over your mouth and you snuck out past the watch. The Holy Ghost will catch you in here. Haven't you ever had the Holy Ghost prompt you on the inside? Don't say that. Don't say that. What's he trying to do? He's trying to help us live accurately. He's trying to help us with our mouth. Don't violate. When he goes to catch you and stop, you follow him. See? Step back from that. Oh, even if you're mid statement. If you're mid statement. Oh, I'm gonna. No, I'm not gonna go there. Amen. Hallelujah. The fifth thing. The fifth hindrance to growing in grace or growing up spiritually like other people. Some struggle because they're trying to be like somebody else. Just be like Jesus. Be like how he wants you to be. Be the best version of you. Amen. Know this. That whatever God's called you to will have different guidelines for you. You can't say, well, they get to do that. You don't know what God's preparing and training them for. Kathryn Kuhlman made this statement. She was someone who had a Healing ministry in the 1970s, a phenomenal healing ministry. She said, I can't live my life like other women. She said, I don't get to go shopping. She wasn't saying shopping is wrong. She said, I can't spend my time like others do because of what God expects of me. Find out what God expects of you. And don't look at somebody else and say, well, they get to do it. It doesn't matter what they get to do. It matters. What's God training you for? What's God preparing you for? You know, one of the most outstanding people in the Bible to me is Joseph. I mean, this young man sold by his family. You think, well, can it get any worse? You're sold. Yeah, just hang on a minute, Joseph. It's fixing to get worse. You're going to get accused of a crime that a mock trial they're going to put you up in front of, and you're put in prison for years, and your youth is gone, Joseph. But God was building a man. God was building a man. He was building a man from the time he was about 17. God had him ready by the time he was 30 to be second in command of. Think of the fast track that young man was on, that God said, he's ready by the age of 30 to be second in command of the greatest nation on earth. It's amazing. If you'll go God's course, he'll put you on the fast track, and he'll put you in places you never could have gone. But you can't do it. Trying to be like other people and equaling other people. You have to know what you're born for and give yourself to that. Well, are you helped tonight? Hallelujah. Thank God for the word. It's an unusual. It's an unusual direction for me to take in a meeting like this, but if God says it, he's prescribing it for us. Why we are. We are wanting to see Jesus come back. God's preparing us. We read it over there in Luke. God's preparing us, and we have to let him prepare. I said we have to let him do that preparation work. Cooperate with him and praise the Lord. Hallelujah. Stand with me to your feet. Father, we thank you so much for all the services this week. My, my, my. We've been blessed. We've been refreshed. We thank you. Brother Copeland spoke things to us that. My, my, my. To hear from that office, to hear from that place. We're so blessed with what, Brother Richard? That ministry thank you for that. For Brother Jesse and Sister Kathy, thank you so much for Pastor Craig and all these ministers that have brought so much to these services. We thank you so, so much. We appreciate it. We purpose to go back home different. We're not going to leave what we got in the building, but we leave this place and we say we're doers of the word. We move with you. We move with your word. We move with your spirit. We walk as you would have us to walk. And we thank you, Father, for your goodness to us. We worship you. We magnify you. Let's sing something. In my life. Lord, be glorified, be glorified. Sing it again. In my life. Be glorified, be glorified in my life can we put up our hands? Let's just do it one more time, everybody. Lord, be glorified Be glory, Lord. Day Be glorified today. I so love the body of Christ. All the body. I love the body. I love the body. I love the body. But I especially love those that God has put shoulder to shoulder with me. That's you. You're shoulder to shoulder with one another as we're running this race. And I so appreciate that you are hungry for what God's doing. And thank you for going with us this week. Thank you so, so much to all of you who came, the congregation members. Many of you drove to be from other congregations to be with us. You. You drove distances. You flew distances. Thank you, pastors, ministers. Thank you so much. I think there were like 155 pastors that registered in these meetings. Thank you so much. What you bring to the services helps us and those who came from foreign countries. We introduced you last night. Thank you so, so much. We so value that and appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I say to my family. Stephen, too. That book worked on you, brother. You did a good job this morning. Yeah, I know. Stephen. Come up. Morgan. Come up. Bear, come. Come on, come on, come on. And Grant's already up here. There's Bubby. There's Nanny K. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then the staff. The staff. Thank you so much to our staff. We love you. We appreciate you. The ministry of helps here at World Harvest Church. Because you do what you do. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Because you do what you do, we get to do what we, what we do. So thank you, World Harvest Church. We love, love, love, love, love you. Deneen, who is head over our all ministry of Help, she said we filled 1100 Ministry of Help positions this week with our people thank you so, so much. That means many of you took multiple positions, and some of them, as you heard Stephen say, they're saying till well after midnight. Getting here early. Thank you so much and we appreciate it. What about this music team? Brother David, thank you not only for the services that you did, but the worship sessions. Thank you so much. Thank you, Brother Tony. Thank you, man. I appreciate it. Jacob Smith over there on the bass. We love you, Jacob. Thank you for coming. And what about Jason in there? In the drum? In the drum room there? Thank you, Jason. Love you. Ms. Cindy Black, thank you for coming and being a part of it. Thank you. Ms. Reba Rambo. Are you kidding? Thank you so much. Brother Jeff, thank you for that song tonight. Thank you for bringing her. Appreciate it. Ms. Joy. Thank you, Brother Tony. Thank you. All the singers this week. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Hallelujah. We love you. And we look forward to more times together. Right? More times together. Will you come back? We trust you've enjoyed this message. 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