Everybody happy to be in church this morning? If you are not happy to be here, we’re gonna pray for you in a minute. For real, some people may not be happy to be here, may have been coaxed or tricked, or maybe think they’re at the movies, or come to the wrong place by accident—it has happened before and there may be somebody here who’s not having a good day, month, or year, and we’re glad you’re here. This is the place you need to be and we want to pray for you. So let’s pray. Lord, we just thank you so much that we can come to church and we can get help. Thank you for the young lady who spoke to me recently, she just can’t stop smoking marijuana. We just pray you’d help her. We pray you’d empower her. We pray you’d help her to be sober and to enjoy being sober, and all the other issues that may be plaguing her. We pray that you would just encourage us. That is why we’re here. We’re not here to hear a sermon and just go home, we’re here to experience God and his power. I pray that we would do that. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Let me say something to all the people who are regulars, that let’s be careful that we don’t get into a pattern or habit of just coming to church, forgetting why we’re here. You’re walking into church next to people who are here for the first time, maybe at church for the first time in their life. Believe it or not, many people never go to church and they come here for the first time. People who are coming here with a lot of burdens, suicidal, marriage broke up, husband just beat them last night, and you never know. So we always want to be a light to those people. What I say for the next three hours is not going to be able to change—forty minutes or so—is not all that’s going to change their life. Sometimes they need a relationship with you out there. Let’s keep that in mind. The other thing is that last week was mother’s day. We did not have roses for all the moms. So, can we have all the moms, one more time, stand up? We want to give you all a round of applause—all the moms. So we have roses for the moms. If you are not a mother, do not take a rose. For real. People last week were just grabbing roses! This is not for the women, this is for the moms. If you want to be a mom, this is not for you. We ran out of roses last week after the 9:30 [service]. Because women were taking them and they shouldn’t have been? I don’t know. This is for the moms only. Moms, if you see a young lady that you know is not a mom taking a rose, just snatch it out of her hand! And you keep it. You don’t have to give it back.
Let’s see your Bibles, pens, lesson plan. Let’s turn to Luke 8. Star Wars is coming. How many of you are going to see Star Wars? You know what I was thinking the other day? This doesn’t have anything to do with the sermon. How was it that C3PO has the same voice? That was like 20 years ago. That brother’s probably old now. Is that a person? Isn’t it a person giving the robot a voice? How does he have the same voice? The same guy [is] twenty years older. Is it really the same guy? That’s a trip. That’s a cool dude, C3PO. He’s just so logical. He’s like the new generation of “Danger, danger, Will Robinson!” Remember him? Lost in Space.
Seven or eight, nine years ago I did a video, a series of videos, for public schools. One on anger, violence, one on sexual purity, and one on something else, and one on gangs. In the gang video we had about thirty, forty kids in a classroom asking questions. “What are gangs? Why are kids getting in gangs? What are they getting out of it?” At the end of the discussion, after hearing all the answers, I said, “Is there anything good about gangs?” They said, “None.” “Would you advise a kid, for his well-being and his advancement in life, to get in a gang?” They said, “No. There’s nothing good about it.” I said, “Why do you do it then?” I was thinking about this. Do you think the devil and the demons believe that Jesus Christ is God? Do you think they worship him as God? Do you think they obey what he says? Do you think that they fear him as judge? Some of you say, “Yes,” some of you say, “No.” We’re going to talk about that in a minute. But why is it, that if they do believe he is God (which we’re going to see in a minute), and [if] they do worship him when he comes into their presence (which we’re going to see in a minute), [if] that they do what he says when he talks to them, [if] they do fear his judgment ([as] we’re going to see in a minute), [if] they do know he is judge and fear him as judge ([as] we’re going to see in a minute), then why is it that they tell us not to, and we believe them? They tell us, “Don’t worship him.” They tell us, “Don’t believe he’s God.” That’s why we have all these religions where people doubt whether he’s really Lord. They tell us, “Don’t fear hell. God’s not going to send you to hell.” They tell us, “You don’t have to obey him all the time. Don’t do everything he says.” Why is that? When they in fact do?
We’re just closing out the series on “Who is Jesus Really?” Next week we’re having a quiz on everything we’ve learned the whole year. It’s going to be great. You really need to come. It’s not a quiz where you write down answers and we go back and forth with a lot of yelling and screaming, it’s going to be a lot of fun. Today’s the last sermon on “Who is Jesus, Really?” We’ve looked at “Who does the Father and the Spirit say he is?” (He’s Christ.) “Who does He say he is?” (He says he’s Christ, the son of God.) “Who do his critics say he is?” (They also say that He said he’s God.) “Who did He say he was?” (Of course, He says he’s God.) “Who do his disciples say he is?” (They said he’s God.) We’re going to see in a minute that even the demons and the devil believe he’s God. They never doubt he’s God.
Let’s do a little review. If you’re taking notes you can write these verses down. Isaiah 12, Isaiah 14 says that Satan, Lucifer, liar, father of lies, destroyer, accuser of the brethren—some of his names—Satan was an angel in heaven. He was one of God’s top angels. The angels are in ranks; he was one of God’s top angels. He got in trouble because he wanted to be higher in the company. He wasn’t satisfied with junior vice president; he wanted to be president and dethrone the president. Too bad, God ain’t going to be dethroned. So he got thrown down to earth. [In] Luke 10, Jesus says he saw Satan getting thrown down to earth like lightning. Revelation 12 tells us he took one-third of the angels with him; they are now demons. Matthew 9 says that he is the prince of demons. In other words, he organizes the demons.
Now you have to understand something. The devil is not unorganized. He is extremely organized. The devil doesn’t mess around. This is my own theory—the devil doesn’t mess around with people like us. He’s at a thirty [thousand] foot level, in business terms, big picture, visionary, strategy. He has plans, resource allocation. He understands how to budget time and resources, his demons. He knows how to position them around the world in certain strategic places to have the maximum impact of evil on the planet. He is big picture. He deals with presidents and prime ministers and governments and economies. That’s what he does. Example: you know that in Muslim nations, they call us “The Great Satan.” Do you know why they do that? There is legitimacy to that. We have pornography like they never had pornography. We have drug addiction, alcoholism, like they never had. We have stuff on television that is absolutely from the pit of hell that we watch at seven o’clock in the afternoon and we would have our kids watch: witchcraft, pornography, naked women on TV every day like it’s no big deal. They say, “We don’t want that!” You know what, there’s nothing wrong with that; some of what they have as a replacement is no good, but they don’t have liquor stores on every corner. They don’t have that. So you have to understand the context of what they say. I’m not saying their religion is right, but I’m telling you that their point of view of the evils in our society is correct. The devil is a mastermind. The devil’s going to use America for a lot of evil.
Satan himself [is] polluting governments. He has countries fighting with each other, countries making nuclear weapons. He has demons running around with smaller people and then people like us, we probably have demonic forces influencing us, but a lot of times we just make our own problems because we’re just sinful. One time this devil was on a curb crying. Someone was walking by [and heard], “Waaaah.” He said, “What’s wrong with you, devil, why are you crying?” He couldn’t stop crying. The guy said, “Devil, you done mess up the whole world. You’ve got people killing each other, raping, ripping each other off, lying, cheating, stealing. Why are you so depressed?” He said, “These Christians are always blaming me for stuff I didn’t get a chance to do!” Don’t blame your stuff on the devil all the time. For all of us old people in here who remember Flip Wilson, Geraldine, “The devil made me do it?” How many of you don’t know what I’m talking about? Raise your hands. Wow! How many do not know who Flip Wilson is? It’s OK. Flip Wilson, he’s passed away, he’s a comedian and he used to dress up like a woman [named] Geraldine, and he used to say, “The devil made me do it.” Well, the devil ain’t make you do that, you’re just freaky! In the Bible, the devil, demons, possess people. Demon possession is very real. You’ve seen the movie The Exorcist. It’s very real. My brother and I saw it when we were little kids. That movie scared the bejeebies out of us. I don’t know what a bejeebie is, but I don’t have them anymore! I had two brothers and two sisters, and all of us boys slept in the same room growing up, but that night we slept in the same bed, back to back! I watched one half of the room, he watched the wall. Right before we went to sleep I said, “Mark, oooooooaaaaaah!” And he went [gesture, scared face.] Demon possession is real. When people are possessed they have supernatural strength, voices will come out, demons will actually speak from them. They can cause disability, blindness, muteness. I’m not saying people with blindness or muteness are demon possessed but the devil can manifest that. Mental problems—some people who are in psychiatric hospitals are demon possessed. Split personality—I believe some of those people are demon possessed. But they can’t help them because it’s spiritual not psychological. The demons you see, even in the Bible, these conditions and manifestations in people. The one thing you have to understand, nowhere in the Bible do these demons and devils ever deny that God exists. The Bible says in James, “You believe there’s one God? Good. So do demons and they shudder.” That means they “Hoooo” at the name of Christ. Why? Because they were in heaven with him. They worshipped him. They know who he is and they ain’t messing around. Because they know who he is. You and I can play these games, “Well, you know, God, there’s a lot of gods…” They don’t say that! They go, “There’s one God. Oh, and let me tell you, he is almighty!” What they want you to believe is something completely different. They want you to believe there’s a whole bunch of gods. We had a guy here last week, at the 7:15 service, he’s a pastor in India. I was asking people where they were from and he stood up and said, “I am from India.” The brother was telling us all about it. He’s a pastor and he plants churches. I said, “How many gods are in India?” “Millions.” That’s the devil: “Believe anything but don’t believe it the truth.” That’s his plan.
Let’s read the story. Luke 8:26. We’re looking at five things demons know about the identity of Christ but don’t want you to know. Then they sailed to the country of the Gatarines which is opposite Galilee. He stepped on land and there met him a man from a city who had demons for a long time. Demons, plural. He wore no clothes, he was naked, and did not live in houses but in tombs, caves. When he saw Jesus he fell down before him and with a loud voice he said, “What have I to do with you Jesus, son of the most high God? I beg you, do not torment me. Number one, demons consider Jesus worthy of their worship and so should we. What’s the first thing they did? They bowed down to him. Now you may say, “Well, that’s not worship.” Let me clarify what worship is: worship is a response of respect. Some of you are singing but not worshipping; there’s a difference. You can sing a secular song. Does that mean you’re worshipping? You ain’t worshipping God. Worship is a response of respect. Some of you are singing out of habit and are just checking out the honeys! Come on now. Some of you are singing like this. That ain’t worship. Know what they did—the demons? They did this, “Oh my God.” [gestures, bowing]. When’s the last time you did that?
Let’s read. Mark 5:5. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. Same story. He was in the mountains, and the tombs, crying out, cutting himself with stones. When he saw Jesus from afar, he worshipped him. Mark 3:11. And unclean spirits, whenever they saw him, fell down before him, crying out saying “You are the son of God.” Luke 8. What did they do? They fell down before him out of respect. That is worship. If someone fell down at my feet and you were watching you’d say, “Get up fool!” It’s an act of worship. My brother played football at Syracuse University. He was an All-American, Heisman runner up, quarterback, they were undefeated, broke all these records. He was the man at Syracuse during that time. I went to a game, and we were walking back from the game, where he threw four touchdowns in the first half and they took him out. He was really good. Walking down the street, no lie, me and my brother and my mom. This little young college student girl walking down, she realized it was Don McPherson and she grabbed his hand and kissed his hand. Ewww! Have any idea how crusty that old fool is? That was an act of respect and worship. When these demons saw Christ the first thing they did every time was they worshipped. They did not do, “Whassup? What you want?” No. How do you worship God when we have our worship time? What do you do? Sit like this? Let me tell you something. If Christ showed up you would not be doing this. You wouldn’t. I don’t care how bad you think you are. You would not. Let me tell you why you wouldn’t. Your brain wouldn’t even be what processes your response. Your heart, your body, your soul, your whole being would involuntarily throw you to the ground. No lie. You wouldn’t be able to help yourself.
When I first got saved I would not lift my hands to the Lord. I would just rock. Then after I saw people lifting their hands, I was like, “I’m not lifting my hands up!” For whatever reason, we don’t do it. We’re scared, we’re going to look funny, we’re embarrassed, we’re prideful. No. “I’m just gonna sit there like this.” No. You’re not free, you’re still bound up. So I just sat down and rocked a little bit. “I don’t want to dance like that guy.” I realized that because I didn’t do that, there was something I didn’t have, which was freedom. So I was in Chino prison. There’s a chapel. Nobody knows me up in the prison. So I’m sitting way up in the front row on the right side. All the inmates are behind me. I started to rock, then said, “I’m going to lift my hands. Today’s going to be the day.” So I did what I call “The Tyrannosaurus Rex.” [demonstrates] Come on, now! How many of you all have been doing this? So I did that for a few months. When the police point a gun at you, what do you do? Oh no! Amen? This is not “Praise the Lord,” this is “I surrender!” That’s what it means. So when you sing to God, you are saying, “I surrender.” You can also praise God like this. Ever pray like that? You should try it. Don’t wake up and go, “[sigh] Dear God, I just pray you bless my day, I’m so tired [snore], aaiight.” You know what demons do? Why is it they worship better than us? Because they know who he is, and let me tell you, the degree to which you worship God is directly related to how well you know who he is. You can’t know God really intimately and have attitude when you worship him. You can’t! Those two things don’t go together.
Number Two. The demons acknowledge Jesus as God and so should we. They know. Verse 28. It’s powerful. When he (the demon possessed man) saw Jesus, he fell down before him and cried out with a loud voice, “What have I do to with you, son of Jesus the son of the most high God?” Not “prophet,” not “teacher,” not “good moral leader,” [but] “son of the most high God!” That’s exactly who Jesus said he was. That’s exactly what they killed him for saying who he was—son of the most high! Look at Luke 4:33. Now in the synagogue there was a man who had the spirit of an unclean demon. He cried out with a loud voice, “Let us alone. What have we to do with you, Jesus of Nazareth? Did you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the holy one of God. Verse 40. When the sun was setting, all those who were sick with various diseases were brought to him. He laid hands on them and healed them. The demons also came out of many, crying out, saying, “You are the Christ, the son of God.” Luke 8. There’s more, by the way. Over and over, when Satan tempted Christ in Matthew 4, he says, “If you are the son of God,” not a “prophet” or a “teacher”—he was trying to manipulate his mind. They know who he was! There was no question. Never do they question that, because they know. Do you know he’s the son of God? There are so many religions, “Jesus is not the son of God, he is not the only way, he’s Lucifer’s brother, he’s an angel, he’s a love child of God and God’s wife.” All this trash the other cults and religions propagate. He is the son of God, the only mediator between man and God. These demons know it. Why do they know it? Because they worshipped him in heaven. They know it. You and I have not been to heaven. I’m going to take their word for it. I’m going to take the Holy Spirit’s word for it. It’s the same thing. I’m going to take the Father’s word for it, Jesus’ own words. It’s the same thing: “I am the son of God.” And, “I am the judge.” You’ll see in a minute. There is a hell. They know it. What’s ironic is that if there was any doubt, or any shred of evidence that Christ wasn’t God, the demons would tell us. There is none. So all they do is lie to you and tell you other stuff, but it ain’t what they believe. They believe and they have to tell the truth when they’re required to. If you’re ever involved in exorcism, the only way you can successfully exorcise a demon from somebody—which does happen—is that you have to speak in Jesus’ name, because to Jesus’ name they have to submit. There’s a story in Acts 19 where these Jews were trying to exorcize a demon out of somebody, but they didn’t have enough of the Holy Ghost “juice.” And the demon said—this is funny, because the demons will talk to you from somebody—“Jesus we know, Paul we know about, but you? Oh!” And they beat the people up, took all their clothes, and had them run off naked. So they respond to Christ’s word, as we’re going to see in a minute, but why? Because he is the authority. He is God. They have to.
Number Three. Demons know that judgment is coming and so should we. Look what it says in Luke 8:28. The last sentence, the last seven words: I beg you, do not torment me. Everyone say “I beg.” These demons aren’t saying, “Jesus, what do you want? You can’t do nothing to us! You ain’t got no authority over us.” Oh no, they ain’t saying that. They’re saying, “Please!” Let’s keep reading, look at verse 31. And they begged him, that he would not command them to go out into the abyss. The abyss is the bottomless pit. They’re going to go to the abyss, and after the abyss they’re going to the lake of fire. They know that. Here’s a little scenario. I don’t know if it’s me, but over the last month, almost every day, five days a week easy, there’s some little girl getting abducted, raped, killed, stabbed, whatever. One young girl the other day was kicked to death by her stepfather and had her head cut off with garden tools. It was on TV, have you seen this? What is all this? Satanic. People blowing themselves up in the Middle East in the name of God? Satanic. Just consider the evil that you see on TV and that’s a fraction of what’s really going on in this world. I want you to think. If God told you, “I’m going to give you one hour to create a place that is designed to punish the inventor of all this evil,” what would you come up with? A dark room with worms, spiders, evil sounds, fire? Just how bad could you make a place? How painful, how wicked can you make this place? Whatever you think of, you ain’t even close to what hell is. Hell is going to be hell. Think about this one: Satan was at one of the highest positions in heaven. He was right there at the throne of God. He threw it all away to torment us, which is what he’s doing now. God said, “Brother, you are going to hell.” In Matthew 25:41 Jesus says Depart from me you who are cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil. What does that mean? Hell was not prepared for humans. You don’t have to go to hell. The Bible says that all of us are sinners and the penalty of sin is, ultimately, hell. But that hell was not created for you. It was created for the devil and think about how bad that place has to be after all the evil he created on this earth. Christ says, “If you accept me as your savior, not only will you not go to hell, you will not experience glimpses of hell here.” You know when you get hung over, you get your heart broken, you get depressed, you’re just like, “Aaaah, man, I just feel like garbage.” Anybody ever feel that? Yes or No? “I feel like hell!” No you don’t. You don’t know what hell is. You ain’t got a clue. You don’t want to have to go there. Jesus says, “Look, if you confess your sin, I’ll forgive you. And then we can start heaven now.” When you ask Christ to be your savior, you enter into heaven. The Bible says that heaven’s going to live in you, and that every day you walk with God, the more disciplined you walk with God, the more of heaven you experience here on earth. Then when your body ceases to function you {?} will go to heaven. You experience God and there’s a whole bunch of good stuff after that. So why would you say, “I don’t want that. I’m going to take my chances with the liar.” But here’s how foolish the devil thinks we are: he’s going to tell us, “there’s no hell, Christ is not the answer,” yet he believes it! Yet he’s going to tell you, and this is all in the Bible, “I know you’re reading it, but don’t believe that’s what I said. Come with me. I have something better for you.” What’s he got for you? Hell. Heartbreak. A.C. Green, who played in the NBA—how many of you all don’t know who A.C. Green is? Wow—he just played like five years ago—please don’t take this as an insult but how many of you don’t know who Michael Jordan is?—A.C. Green literally played in the NBA twenty years, a long time. He is a single man who’s never had sex in his life. He’s a Christian. He was on the Merv Griffin show. Now if you don’t know who Merv Griffin is, that’s OK. But Merv Griffin says, “So you never had sex. Don’t you feel like you’re missing out?” He said, “Yeah, I’m missing out on gonorrhea, syphilis, unwanted pregnancy, all the stuff you never talk about.” That’s what the devil’s telling you—let’s do this—but he’s not telling you the bad stuff.
Number Four. Demons feared Jesus as Lord over their judgment and so should we. Look at verse 28, the last sentence. I beg you, do not torment me. Verse 31: They begged him (Jesus) that he would not command them go into the abyss. Let me tell you something. You can please man, you can have all your buddies think you’re a good person, it don’t matter. God does. Billy Graham was on Larry King Live and they asked him what he expected God would say to him when he faced God. He said, “I just hope God says, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’” Now you would say, “Why would Billy Graham feel like he hasn’t done a good job?” Because only Billy Graham knows what God’s called him to do. You look at Billy Graham, who’s spoken to millions of people, and say, “He’s done a great job.” But what if God had it designed for Billy Graham to speak to billions of people but Billy Graham’s faith wasn’t big enough? I’m not implying that at all but my point is this: you never know what God has called someone to do. You never know what God’s gifted someone to do. Don’t ever compare yourself to someone else, your inside to someone else’s outside, in other words, “Here’s what I think I should do” compared with what you think someone else should do, or because I’m doing more than them, I must be better than them. Don’t ever think that because that’s not Biblical. God’s given everybody a different lot in life, different gifts, different talents, different calling, with different potential. All you need to do is be faithful with what God has given you. He’s given different people different amount of time to give, different amount of money, different amount of talents and quality and quantity of talents to provide. You have to be faithful with what God has given you. So when you go to bed at night, there’s only one person you have to answer to. It ain’t your mother, it ain’t your wife, it’s God. When you wake up in the morning, you [have] got one person to answer to. When you do everything during the day, you [have] got one person to answer to—God. These demons knew there’s only one person they had to answer to, Jesus. “Jesus, please don’t torment us.” He’s the only one who can. By the way, Jesus [doesn’t] want to torment you. He wants to give you the opportunity to be saved, not only from hell but from yourself. Say “Amen.” When we get ourselves in trouble, we get ourselves into trouble. It ain’t the devil. By the way, the devil can’t make you do anything. It’s a Biblical fact. The devil cannot force you into any sin. Every sin you commit, you commit voluntarily. He tricks you, but in the end, once you make that step to sin, he backs off. Right before you sin, because his name is “accuser,” he says, “Hey God, look at your Christian friend!” You ever sinned and feel guilty? Say “Amen.” That’s because one of the devil’s name is “Accuser of the Brethren.” “God, look at that Christian! Look at that! He was just at the Rock this morning! They’re at Happy Hour, it’s been like Happy Week for them!” You’ve only got one person to be accountable to—Jesus Christ. Not your pastor, not your priest, not your rabbi, not your mom, not your parents—Jesus Christ. That’s who you have to be responsible to. You know what he says? “I died for your sin.” We have a bunch of paintings back there from our art ministry, they’re great, they’re all for this series. There’s one painting, the biggest one back there, of Jesus carrying the cross. He’s all cut up. Go look at it when you go by. He got beat down for our sins. He’s the only one you got to be accountable to. He’s going to say, “I did all this for you. I got my back beaten, I got nails put in my hands and feet, just for you, and you did what? You thought there was another way? Who did for you what I did for you? Who offered you salvation like I offered you salvation? Who was patient all your life like I’ve been patient all your life? Who knows everything about you and still loves you anyway like me? Who?” Nobody! You have to answer to him.
Lastly. Demons submit to the Word of God, His Word, and so should we. They worshipped him with a response of respect. They knew who he was. They knew he was judge and they knew judgment was coming. And they submit to his word. When he tells them to jump, do you know what they do? They jump. “Get out of him.” They go. Verse 31: They begged him that he would not command them to go out into the abyss. A herd of many swine was feeding there on the mountain. They begged him that he would permit them to enter them, and he permitted them, and the demons went out of the man and entered the swine. Turn to Mark 1:23. There was a man in the synagogue who had an unclean spirit and the unclean spirit cried out, “Let us alone. What have we to do with you, Jesus of Nazareth? Did you come to destroy us? I know who you are.” But Jesus rebuked the spirit, saying, “Be quiet and come out of him.” And when the unclean spirit convulsed him, crying out with a loud voice, he came out. Turn to Mark 9:25. A little boy is demon-possessed. When Jesus saw that the people came running together, he rebuked the unclean spirits saying, “You deaf, dumb spirit, I command you to come out of him and enter him no more. The spirit cried out, convulsed him greatly, came out of him. And he became as one dead, so that many said “He is dead.” But he wasn’t dead. Every time Jesus says, “Go out,” what do they do? They say, “We ain’t going nowhere, who are you?” No, they say, “We be going.” When Jesus tells you to do something, do you do it? Don’t raise your hand, please don’t raise your hand, I’m going to ask you a question. How many of you, God told you to volunteer for ministry and you went to sign up, but you didn’t follow through? How many of you made a commitment to tithe and you don’t tithe? How many of you made a commitment to go to small group and you don’t go to small group? How many of you [that] God told you to pray every day, read your Bible every day, and you don’t do it? Well, what’s up with that? “Well…” Well, what? Do you have something better to do than what God wants you to do? Because you know better for your life than what God knows, that right? No. You just think you do. The devil’s just playing a mind game with you. The devil’s telling you this, “He speaks to me, I jump. You don’t have to. When he tells me to do something, I do it. But you don’t have to because you’re ‘saved.’ Because you’re saved, you know more and you know just as much as God knows about your life, so when he tells you to do something you just pray about it. Maybe he’s wrong, or maybe your prayers don’t matter, or maybe the Bible is not going to change your life.” He’s telling you all these lies. By the way, don’t think that because you’re healthy, relatively speaking, and you live in a nice community, nice weather, you may have a nice place to live, a place to live, don’t think that because those things are true that you are blessed to the degree you could be blessed. Don’t settle for what you have. Say, “God, I want everything you have for me.” Don’t settle. Don’t let the devil trick you into being lackadaisical. What God has for you is not that when you say, “I want more, God,” it doesn’t mean necessarily that you have to have more money. What about more spiritual power? That when you pray for somebody, something happens? What about when you share Christ with someone and they get saved? What about praying and God gives you visions for your life? What about having wisdom to help other people out? What about that? What about, “God, I want more of you!” By the way, the only way you get it is just by being obedient. If you get in the habit of doing what God says to you, when he says it to you, as thoroughly and completely as he says it, that is the definition of a lot of faith. A little bit of faith is not obeying what God tells you. It’s all about obedience. When these demons were spoken to by God, they did it. Why? Because they honored his authority. They did not mess with his authority. We need to not mess with his authority.
In a minute we’re going to pray. Here’s what’s going to happen. Some of you all in here don’t know Christ as your savior. And we’re all going to bow our heads and close our eyes in a minute. We’re going to close our eyes so we’re not distracted, we’re going to bow our heads out of respect for God, and we’re going to give you the opportunity to finally say, “I want Jesus to be my savior. I believe he is God. I believe he died for my sin. I believe there’s a hell that I should be going to.” You know, I hated to get in trouble when my brothers and sisters did something. Remember that? Your mother or father would come say, “All right. Who spilled the milk?” “I ain’t do it!” We had five kids in our family and we’re all pointing. My mother couldn’t get the truth, my father couldn’t get the truth—we’d all get in trouble. My father had zero patience. Everybody’s going to get punished! So we’d all have to stand in the corner. Anybody remember that? Standing in the corner? How many of you all never stand in the corner? Oh! You all gotta stand in the corner before you leave today. You gotta experience standing in the corner. You stand in the corner of your room, living room or whatever, you just had to stand there like this. For like seventeen hours! No food, no sleep, just tie you to the wall. My brothers, my sisters are standing over there. We’d play these games to see who moved. We’d talk to each other in code. “Who can touch the middle of the floor?” You’d have to go away from the corner, touch the floor, and come back. And if you got caught…you couldn’t live to the next Christmas! I hated getting in trouble when I didn’t do anything. Why would you want to go to hell and be in a place that wasn’t designed for you? Why would you want to experience a second-rate life here on earth that wasn’t designed for you? God does not desire you to be addicted, depressed, discouraged. He wants you to walk with him and be blessed, have purpose, a sound mind, vision, spiritual power, spiritual gifts, a productive life. That’s what he wants for you. Can being a Christian give you that? Most definitely, as long as you obey when you get saved. So here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to pray, and then I’m going to lead you in a prayer to ask Christ to be your savior for all of you who have never done that. Then I’m going to ask all you who prayed that prayer as everyone’s eyes are closed and heads are bowed, we’re going to ask you to stand up. After everyone’s stood up, then we’re going to ask you to come forward. Now in your mind, “Aaah, ain’t no way I’m going to stand up in this place—all these people looking at me walking down there.” That’s the devil talking. The devil does not want you to live for Christ in public. He wants it to be your own little private deal, so that when he tells you to do something bad, no one knows about it. It’s all a mind game. When God says, “Listen, I want to bless you in public. I want to walk with you in public. I want to bless your life, and you better walk with me in public.” Just like you’ve been representing yourself all these years, representing your company, your hobbies, your desires, I want you to represent me in public.” And it starts with, “God, I’m being counted.” So in a minute we’re going to bow our heads and pray. The devil’s going to tell you all these lies in your mind. Don’t believe it. He can suck on you all your life. Just think about your life. A young lady came to me the other day, “I’ve been smoking weed since I was twelve, every day, and I’m seventeen. I want to stop.” Praise God. She realized the devil had been messing her up. Guess what? The devil’s work will never bring you happiness. Amen? The heart knows its own bitterness, that’s what the Bible says. Let’s all bow our heads and close our eyes.
Dear Lord, we thank you so much for your dying on the cross for us. We thank you so much for being good to us. We thank you so much that you love us. We thank you so much that you forgive us of our sin. Dear God I thank you that you’re so patient with us, to wait first for us to repent. If you realize that Jesus Christ died for your sin and rose from the dead and you would like Jesus to forgive you of your sin, if you would like for him to become your savior once and for all, I’m going to ask you to pray this prayer with me in the privacy of your heart. But as you pray you must have faith that he loves you and that he will forgive you. In the privacy of your heart pray “Dear God, I believe I’m a sinner. I believe my sin is wrong. I believe that you died for me and rose from the dead. Dear Jesus, please forgive me my sin. Please come live in my heart. Please be my savior and my Lord. Thank you, God.”
As our eyes are closed and our heads are bowed, if you prayed that prayer and today you’re saying, “Yes Lord, I’m giving my life to you,” –eyes closed, heads bowed—we’re asking you to stand to your feet and acknowledge that. Stand up to your feet and acknowledge his forgiveness in your life. God bless you, stay standing, good. By standing you are saying, “Yes Lord, here I am. Count me in.” Don’t believe the devil anymore. He’s been lying to you. He’s been the source of all your problems. Now we’re going to ask all you who are standing to do one more thing. As we all welcome you to the family of God, we’re going to ask you to step out of your seat and come down here to the altar. Let’s give them a hand. Come on down. God bless you. Let’s keep clapping now, encourage them. Amen, amen. I don’t know how many of you have ever walked forward, but it takes a lot of guts to come up here. But it’s going to be good! You just said, “Lord, here I am!” The only thing you’ve got to do, for the rest of your life, is very simple but we make it complex—just do what he says. If you went home today and wrote down a list of five things you know God’s always been wanting you to do, you know. Right? Don’t we? “Gotta get rid of him, of her, of cable, gotta throw those clothes out, gotta stop eating that food, drinking, smoking that stuff.” Amen? That’s what you gotta do. Just do that. And I gotta start reading this Book. People in my life will pray for me according to this book. Not pray on me, but pray for me. People who [will] encourage me, who [will] believe in me. It’s very basic. We want to help you in that process. Just let them through over there so we don’t lose them. It’s very important we get them in that room over there.
Next week we have quiz. If you’re new and have never been to one of our master quizzes, you need to come back. It’s fun. I’m going to teach you everything and you’ll get it like this [gesture]. Then we’ll have all of you go out that way. Andrea, you are going to be our leader. All you have to do is follow that guy there and we’ll all follow you.
Lord, we thank you so much for your faithfulness. Thank you so much for your goodness. Thank you so much for forgiveness. Please bless us, God. Lord, may we learn a lesson from the devil and his demons. Their reaction of you is based on their knowledge of you. If we don’t have that same reaction we need to get more knowledge. I pray we would do that—knowledge of who you are, how amazing you are, how much you love us. I pray you would bless these people standing here. I pray you would honor their faith. I pray you would transform their life. In Jesus’ Name.
