BISHOP NOEL JONES - NO PLACE TO QUIT
Category
📚
ÉducationTranscription
00:00 (upbeat music)
00:02 (upbeat music)
00:05 (upbeat music)
00:34 - I want you to notice in Romans chapter four,
00:39 verse one through seven,
00:42 and I'm also going to read Psalms 32,
00:47 one through seven.
00:49 And it is Paul who is, in Romans,
00:55 quoting from the Psalmist.
01:03 And of course, in Romans one,
01:06 he is espostulating the doctrine
01:11 of condemnation to mankind in general.
01:15 In chapter two, he moves
01:19 to the Jewish community,
01:27 and he's saying in spite of the fact that you have
01:31 the Pentateuch, the Torah,
01:33 in spite of the fact that you have the law,
01:36 and you had the honor of being led by a pillar of fire
01:41 at night and a pillar of cloud by day,
01:45 you had the presence of the Lord in a miraculous
01:48 and marvelous way to overcome every enemy
01:52 that ever approached you.
01:54 He said, you were not excused because
01:58 you yourself have done wrong.
02:01 In chapter three, he concludes that all have sinned
02:06 and come short of the glory of God,
02:09 and then he begins his doctrinal sojourn
02:14 into justification.
02:16 In order to deal with justification,
02:20 he has to first preach the doctrine of condemnation,
02:24 because he has to bring us to the place
02:26 where we decide that we are not in position
02:31 ourselves to save ourselves,
02:34 but we need the power of God to bring us out
02:38 of the hand of Satan.
02:41 It is here then in the doctrine of justification
02:44 that he purports we take a look at Abraham,
02:49 but in the middle of what he is saying about Abraham,
02:53 he reaches back into the Psalms,
02:57 and he alludes to the statement of David,
03:02 beginning at chapter four, verse one of Romans.
03:06 What shall we say then that Abraham, our father,
03:10 as pertaining to the flesh, hath found?
03:12 For if Abraham were justified by works,
03:17 he hath whereof to glory, but not before God.
03:23 For what saith the scripture?
03:25 Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him
03:29 for righteousness.
03:30 Now to him that worketh is the reward,
03:34 not reckoned of grace, but of debt.
03:37 But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him
03:40 that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted
03:45 for righteousness, even as David also describeth
03:51 the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth
03:54 righteousness without work, saying,
03:57 blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven
04:02 and whose sins are covered.
04:05 Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.
04:10 And the Psalmist that he quotes in 32
04:14 declares, blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven,
04:18 whose sin is covered.
04:21 Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputed
04:24 not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.
04:29 When I kept silence, my bones waxed old
04:31 through my roaring all the day long.
04:34 For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me,
04:38 my moisture is turned into the drought of summer.
04:42 I acknowledge my sin unto thee,
04:44 and mine iniquity have I not hid.
04:47 I said I will confess my transgression unto the Lord,
04:51 and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin.
04:55 For this shall everyone that is godly
04:57 pray unto thee in a time when thou mayest be found
05:01 surely in the floods of great waters.
05:03 They shall not come nigh unto him.
05:06 Thou art my hiding place.
05:09 Thou shalt preserve me from trouble.
05:11 Thou shalt compass me about with the songs of deliverance.
05:17 The Psalm of David, not only is it proved
05:21 by this quotation,
05:25 but it's proved because he uses this
05:31 as part of his declaration of justification.
05:36 It is interesting that the writer Paul
05:40 would even go into David to bring about
05:43 this great doctrine of justification
05:47 because he understands that for us to approach God,
05:52 there has to be means to allow his holiness
05:57 to deal with us.
06:00 And he declares, as David also describeth,
06:04 and that the blessedness of the man
06:07 unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works,
06:13 saying, "Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven
06:17 "and whose sins are covered.
06:18 "Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin."
06:23 This intensifies Paul's argument of justification
06:29 because he is dealing with Abraham
06:32 and yet still he brings in David.
06:36 When he deals with Abraham on the issue of justification,
06:41 he deals with Abraham from the physical sense.
06:44 And what he says is that you can no more justify yourself
06:49 than Abraham can have a baby at 100
06:55 and Sarah at 90.
06:58 You understand how he purports
07:02 and he presents the miracle of justification
07:07 to the place where it is so powerful
07:12 that it can overcome a double impossibility.
07:17 Abraham is 100, if Sarah was 25, it still wouldn't matter.
07:22 Sarah is 90, if Abraham was 25, it still wouldn't matter.
07:28 She had passed her season and he had passed his season.
07:35 So what God does is he brings a double impossibility
07:40 to bear upon the fact that as difficult as it was
07:45 for Abraham and Sarah at their ages to have a baby,
07:51 so is it difficult for you to be justified by your works.
07:56 He points out then that it has to be a grace of God.
08:02 And if you notice his language,
08:04 he's very careful to show us that you couldn't buy it,
08:08 you don't merit it.
08:09 And so now it becomes an act of grace.
08:14 It is not so much what you wanted,
08:16 but what God wanted to do.
08:19 And it just changes the whole platform
08:23 because now I understand that as I walk with God
08:27 in the circumstance where he wants me with him,
08:32 then I will overcome everything that faces me
08:37 because he wants me with him.
08:43 Paul now wants to intensify his argument
08:47 and to intensify his argument,
08:50 he brings in a man who obviously is in need
08:55 of justification without works.
09:00 And so he introduces in the middle of this conversation
09:03 about Abraham and the miracle of Abraham
09:06 having a child at age that it is foreboding.
09:11 He now brings in David, not from the point of view
09:16 of the miracle of having a child,
09:19 but he introduces David as David speaks subjectively
09:23 of a circumstance that he himself was found in
09:28 and he expresses it in the psalm.
09:31 And Paul goes now and he pulls it out
09:34 so that he can make his argument
09:37 of justification more intense.
09:40 He chooses a man who was a man after God's own heart.
09:45 And yet still the product of his flesh,
09:50 his works were outrageously sickening.
09:55 The duplicity of David, oh my God,
09:58 on the one hand, he can be so wonderfully good
10:02 and he can be so marvelously righteous.
10:06 He can be so greatly anointed.
10:10 And yet on the other hand, he can be so viciously evil.
10:15 I wonder if it sounds like anybody in this house.
10:22 On the one hand, he seems to soar
10:26 with angelic, melodious, euphonious power
10:31 as he writes the wonderful things about his God.
10:36 And on the one hand, he seems to be raptured
10:41 or caught up into the heavens of the heavens
10:46 as the anointing of God flows through his mind
10:51 and through his pen.
10:52 And then there's a wonderful good side to David.
10:59 The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want side.
11:04 Yea, though I walk through the valley
11:08 of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil side.
11:12 There's a wonderful great side to David,
11:17 the side that forced Samuel to go down
11:22 and anoint him the eighth of the sons of Jesse,
11:27 the side of David that causes the women
11:30 to walk down the street and declare
11:32 that Saul has killed his thousands,
11:36 but David, his 10,000.
11:39 There's a wonderful side to David
11:42 who is willing to stand against Goliath
11:46 when all the armies of Israel had turned their back.
11:51 One day, he's on the mountaintop,
11:53 but then there's a duplicity with David
11:57 because there is another side.
12:01 There's a frightening side.
12:05 I'm talking to you and I'm talking to me.
12:08 Somebody said to me the other day,
12:11 Bishop, with all God has used you to do,
12:14 which in their evaluation, it's a whole lot,
12:17 why are you still on, you know, so cool with it?
12:21 And I said to them, because I know the other side.
12:25 There is a side that is projected.
12:29 There's a side that flows easily
12:32 and a side where there is no battle,
12:36 where there is no difficulty,
12:38 but then there is another side
12:41 where the shadows fall
12:44 and where the battles are fought
12:46 in the dark and the heat of the night.
12:50 There is another side where the thoughts
12:53 have to be pushed back
12:55 and attitudes have to be controlled
12:58 and behavior has to be subordinated
13:03 to the power of the bright side.
13:06 I wanna talk to some real people here today.
13:09 I don't wanna talk to the walls.
13:11 There, you have another side to you,
13:16 the side that you try to suppress
13:18 when somebody crosses in front of you on the freeway,
13:22 the side that you try to suppress
13:26 when somebody pulls in a parking space at the mall
13:30 that you were sitting there waiting to get,
13:34 the side that you have to suppress on Friday night,
13:39 around about one or two a.m.
13:42 (audience laughing)
13:45 on Friday and on Saturday night
13:47 before you get ready for Sunday.
13:49 There's a side you have to suppress
13:53 when you start talking about other people
13:55 and yes, you start running somebody down.
13:59 On the one hand, you can open your mouth
14:02 and declare the goodness of God,
14:05 but on the other hand,
14:06 that same mouth can run up one side of somebody
14:11 and come down the other side.
14:14 Yes, he brings in David
14:17 because David epitomizes the duplicity
14:20 that runs through all of us.
14:23 On the one hand, he can be so powerful,
14:26 but then on the other hand,
14:28 when he should have been out fighting
14:31 the battles of the Lord, he stayed home
14:35 and what he does now is he looks over the top of his palace
14:40 and he sees this exquisite beauty bathing.
14:45 He should have loosed your hole,
14:48 but he didn't quite make it.
14:51 It's interesting because one could not understand
14:54 how David could have been so wonderful.
14:59 I have listened to the scholars argue
15:01 and many instances they argue
15:04 the attitude of the monarch in those days
15:07 and they equate David's rule to people like Nebuchadnezzar,
15:12 Ahasuerus, Artaxerxes, Pilate,
15:18 and many of the men of his day.
15:21 I went along part of the trip
15:24 because they said he was a despotic monarch
15:28 and a despotic monarch has the power of life
15:32 or death in his hand.
15:34 Do you remember Esther?
15:36 She called for a three day fast
15:38 when she went to see her husband
15:41 because had he not reacted properly
15:46 or had he reacted negatively,
15:49 she could and would have been killed instantly.
15:54 That's why she said, "If I perish, let me perish.
15:58 "I'm going to see the king."
16:00 It was this kind of despotic monarch
16:04 that Nebuchadnezzar was
16:06 and Nebuchadnezzar had the power
16:08 when the Hebrew boys would not bow
16:12 to declare them to heat the fire seven times hotter
16:16 and throw them in the fire.
16:19 He didn't need Congress.
16:21 He didn't need to go to any judicial system.
16:25 He was the system
16:28 and the attitude then of the scholars
16:30 of the Old Testament kings,
16:32 they declare that David had the same power
16:36 because he was a despotic monarch
16:40 in the time in which he lived.
16:42 I went along with that to this point
16:45 and I had to back off
16:47 because David was under a theocratic system.
16:52 He knew God.
16:55 He understood the move of God.
16:59 He bathed in the anointing of God
17:04 and so I can't give him the attitude of Nebuchadnezzar.
17:08 I can't give him the attitude of Hazarious
17:11 or Pilgath, Pilesim
17:14 simply because David had a relationship with God
17:19 that they didn't have.
17:22 Oh, I feel it here.
17:24 It is here then that you cannot understand
17:27 and it's difficult to grasp
17:28 but maybe it's easy if we check ourselves
17:32 that this man could be such a warrior for God
17:36 and still send for Bathsheba.
17:41 On Bathsheba's part,
17:43 I believe had she said no to David,
17:47 even though she would have stuck her life out
17:50 by the standards of those people at the time
17:53 that theologians and scholars,
17:56 she still would have appealed to that side of David
18:01 that was still in contact with God
18:06 because how could he just kill her so blatantly
18:11 when her husband was fighting the war
18:16 that David should have been in himself?
18:23 - Can I preach this thing?
18:24 I wonder, do you have something covered for so long
18:28 that it is now in the place of complacency?
18:33 I wonder, have you done something for so long
18:37 and have set it under your radar screen of your conscience
18:42 that it is now, you are now moving
18:45 to a place of complacency?
18:48 Well, that's where David was.
18:51 He had sinned and Bathsheba declared she was pregnant
18:55 and he covered it now by sending for Uriah.
19:00 Isn't it interesting how man has always tried
19:05 to fix what he has broken?
19:08 Isn't it interesting how you can try to patch up something
19:12 and make it worse instead of making it better?
19:17 He sends for Uriah and I want you to notice
19:19 not only has he taken the man's wife,
19:22 but the little black man, Uriah,
19:25 not only has he taken his wife,
19:27 but now he sends for him to cover it up.
19:32 And Uriah's faithfulness now just shows David's heartlessness
19:37 because Uriah is figuring my fellow soldiers are fighting,
19:44 so why should I go home and have a conjugal visit
19:50 while the fellows are out fighting in the war?
19:54 And so now he stays at David's place
19:59 and he does not go home and it shoots a hole
20:04 in David's plan to send him home
20:08 and then declare that's your child
20:11 because Uriah couldn't argue, there was no DNA testing.
20:17 And so David figured if I can just get him to go home,
20:22 then he might count the months, but so what?
20:26 At least he got home, but not so, not so.
20:30 It just blew David's patent place plan to pieces.
20:34 And so now David gives Uriah a letter to take to Joab
20:39 and you and I would have opened the letter.
20:43 You know, I would have checked and peeped the letter,
20:47 just to see what the king is saying.
20:49 But Uriah in his total loyalty and complete faithfulness
20:55 takes the letter that says put him in the hottest part
21:03 of the battle and then back off him so that he die.
21:09 Can you imagine now the same man who wrote
21:14 the Lord is my shepherd, the same man who so wonderfully
21:19 and so anointedly presented.
21:23 That's why when you look at folk
21:25 and you look at how sanctified they look,
21:29 don't fool yourself, everybody's in a struggle.
21:34 Have I told you touch your neighbor yet?
21:37 Nah, I will after a while.
21:39 Everybody's got to struggle to hold that dark side together.
21:44 And that's why you've got to walk intensely with God.
21:50 You've got to read and meditate in his word.
21:54 You've got to hold on to him with everything that you've got
21:59 because any one of us can slip into the dark side
22:05 at any time.
22:08 You're not too old, mother, don't you look at me
22:11 like Alice in Wonderland.
22:13 I feel like preaching.
22:15 Notice now the complacency because the mind has a way
22:22 of justifying itself or bringing itself where it can handle
22:28 the attitude that it purports
22:33 because we are justifiers of our behavior.
22:36 We can bring ourselves to convince ourselves
22:41 that there was no other way, that this is what I had to do.
22:46 We sometimes talk to ourselves
22:49 and after we put something to bed
22:51 and we move into a complacency
22:55 because the conscience is no longer pricked
22:58 and the action does no longer bother us.
23:03 And so David now has put this thing to bed,
23:06 the child is now born and here's the good side of David.
23:11 It's now reappeared because Nathan comes to David
23:17 and he gives him a little analogy
23:19 and he talks about the fellow who had just one ewe lamb
23:24 and this ewe lamb was now a part of his family.
23:28 And the fellow next door, he had more animals
23:32 than you could count.
23:34 And yet still when someone came to visit the fellow
23:37 with their bountiful number of animals,
23:41 he reached over into the other fellow's house
23:46 and he snatched his one ewe lamb.
23:51 Of course now David as a judge, as a king,
23:55 and right away his temper and his attitude rises
23:59 to the next level.
24:00 He said, "Surely that man shall die."
24:05 And it is here when Nathan looks him in the face
24:10 and says, "Thou art the man."
24:14 I wish you can understand that it is a blessing
24:18 whenever God uncovers your behavior.
24:26 It is a blessing when the Lord will not allow you
24:31 to lose your soul, but he'll get in the middle of your junk
24:36 and never tell me that God won't tell anybody
24:41 because God will tell.
24:45 He told on David, didn't he?
24:47 Give your neighbor a high five and say,
24:50 "I'm so glad that God told on me."
24:55 It is here now where he deals
24:58 because the writer now has to paint the picture,
25:02 the awful picture of David
25:05 because now he awakens to understanding that he,
25:09 that wonderful warrior, that great king, that prophet,
25:14 that psalmist is now in a situation of difficulty.
25:19 Can I take it just a little further?
25:21 I don't wanna bore you with the gory details,
25:24 but can you imagine now that David has to carry
25:29 the attitude of Bathsheba and here's the attitude.
25:34 She's got to hide with her first child.
25:37 She should have been in a state of rejoicing
25:41 because of her first child, but no, she's got to hide
25:46 and David's got to feel the pain
25:50 of her having to hide with her first child.
25:55 She also is now in David's harem
25:59 whereas she was Uriah's only woman.
26:04 She now has to abide in a house with multiple women
26:09 and so now David has to carry that attitude
26:14 because I can hear her saying to him,
26:18 I didn't try to get to you,
26:20 but rather you tried to get to me
26:24 and now you got me dealing with all these you understand
26:29 and he's got to deal with that attitude.
26:34 Thirdly, the psychological debilitation now
26:37 of understanding that he is the cause of the child dying.
26:42 If you notice that the child died
26:47 and David waited and fasted and prayed
26:50 and he got all really upset
26:53 because he now realizes that he is the reason
26:58 why her first child died
27:01 because the Lord did not want that child
27:04 to grow up in Israel
27:06 because he would represent the sin of David.
27:09 I won't go into that.
27:11 The ramifications of that is too much
27:13 for us to stand right here.
27:16 It is here now that the man becomes so glaring
27:21 and David now is faced with this awful action
27:26 that has now been brought back to his attention.
27:29 The Lord regurgitated what he had put way down
27:33 in the back of his stomach
27:36 and here's now where Paul takes the glory
27:39 from the flesh of Abraham
27:41 who sinned less viciously than David
27:45 and now in the text he talks about the father of himself,
27:49 the race himself was justified by works by faith
27:53 according to the flesh.
27:55 That is in contrast to according to the spirit
28:00 because when you have moved to the place
28:03 where you are completely wrecked by your behavior,
28:08 there is no way you can put yourself back together again.
28:13 If God does not step in,
28:17 can I preach this thing like it is?
28:19 If you look at verse two,
28:20 you will see the word if and it is a
28:24 and it is assuming that by is out of,
28:27 it is the source of works.
28:29 He is saying that we have too much of a dark side
28:34 to be able to reach into ourselves
28:37 and bring some work out
28:40 that God would be so astounded by
28:44 that God would say you are all right.
28:47 In speaking of this, one writer says,
28:50 in speaking of the relation of works to justification,
28:54 Paul never uses dia which is by means of or through
28:59 but he uses e which is out of works
29:03 being regarded by the Jew
29:05 as the meritorious source of salvation unquote.
29:09 Abraham believed God
29:12 and it was counted unto him for righteousness.
29:16 It is not his behavior that got him his blessing
29:21 because his behavior could never be good enough.
29:26 You can't behave so good
29:28 that you can move God to justify you.
29:34 It's the blood of Jesus through the grace of God
29:38 that allows you to come in here today
29:42 and lift up holy hands.
29:45 What does the it refer to in the text?
29:49 Alford looks at it and he says the whole question
29:52 as whether this righteousness was reckoned
29:56 as one God's righteousness imputed to the sinner
30:01 so that Abraham too was made righteous
30:04 on account of the merit of his faith.
30:07 Let's follow the compass.
30:09 What Paul does is he proves that everybody is under sin
30:14 and under sin totally unable by works of their own
30:20 to bring and achieve righteousness.
30:24 I come to God with nothing but a messed up rap sheet
30:29 and I can't walk in here and argue with God
30:35 because I am the man.
30:39 I am that sinner.
30:40 I am that low down person
30:44 and it's been proven that when I got here,
30:47 I was born in sin and shapen in iniquity
30:52 and when I got here, lies came straight out of my mouth.
30:57 When I got here, I was looking to connive and be wicked.
31:02 I was searching for something to get into.
31:05 That's why when you see me praising him and lifting him up,
31:10 it's because I know where he brought me from
31:15 and how he brought me out
31:18 and I don't look and act very sententious about it.
31:22 You don't got to check on me.
31:23 I'll tell on myself because when I think of
31:28 the goodness of Jesus and all he's done,
31:33 my soul cries out, I'm glad I'm here.
31:37 I'm glad I'm saved.
31:40 I'm glad he justified me
31:43 so that God then made Abraham righteous
31:47 on account of the merit of his faith.
31:50 It's strictly and entirely a work
31:53 and such would be the efficient cause.
31:56 If you were to say simply that he had faith
31:59 and God made him righteous,
32:02 then faith now would literally become a meritorious attitude
32:07 but that's not what he is saying
32:10 because all faith does is receive what God is giving.
32:15 How might I put it?
32:18 If I, you fell out in the water and you were drowning
32:22 and you were there just struggling, drowning
32:26 and I reached over from the boat and I put my hand out
32:31 and you raised your hand up to receive my hand,
32:35 could you say that you saved yourself?
32:39 The answer is absolutely no
32:42 because you can raise your hand up all you want.
32:45 If there's nobody to pull you up, you can't come up.
32:51 Raising up your hand is, oh God, the faith
32:56 that God gave you to receive his forgiveness.
33:01 Oh, I feel a little churchy right about now.
33:06 Touch your neighbor and say raise your hand up
33:08 and receive your blessing.
33:11 Raise your hand up and receive that new house.
33:15 Raise your hand up and receive that car
33:20 that God has promised.
33:21 Raise your hand up and receive your anointing,
33:26 you're not doing it yourself, but God is doing it for you
33:31 and all you've got to do is receive it.
33:36 It was not the act of believing which was reckoned to him
33:39 as a righteous act or an account of which perfect
33:44 righteousness was laid to his charge,
33:47 but the fact of his trusting God to perform his promise
33:52 introduced him into the blessing promised.
33:57 It is trusting God.
34:00 It is God's word that sparks the promise in my heart
34:05 that says in spite of where I am today,
34:08 I will not be in the same place tomorrow.
34:13 I feel the Holy Spirit and this is why the word
34:18 now becomes count or it comes impute
34:23 and it means to put in one's account,
34:26 to credit one with something,
34:28 to put in deposit what was not there.
34:33 It's like a wire transfer where somebody else has the money
34:37 and they just put it in your account
34:40 and all of a sudden you were poor in sin
34:44 and wake up rich in righteousness
34:48 because God just transferred some power into your account.
34:53 I feel the Holy Ghost, y'all excuse me,
34:57 touch your neighbor, say you got power.
35:00 You haven't even used it yet.
35:03 You have victory that you haven't even used yet.
35:08 You have an anointing that you haven't even used yet,
35:14 but God has put it in your account.
35:19 I feel like lifting him up.
35:23 There is something about you that God has given to you
35:27 and the word here is mythos.
35:30 He put it in your account not as a mythos or as a reward
35:35 because a reward is dues paid for work waged.
35:42 I've got my work on and when I get paid on the weekend,
35:46 I ain't got to tell you thank you
35:49 because this belongs to me.
35:51 You got me working all day and you bring me my check,
35:58 you better bring me my money
36:00 or we gonna have a fight up in here
36:03 'cause it's my money, I deserve it.
36:06 But when I come to God, I come with a praise.
36:11 I come lifting him up.
36:14 I come rejoicing because he didn't have to do it,
36:19 but he did.
36:20 We might as well have church packed.
36:23 It is not as a mythos.
36:26 It is not as a reward, which is not as a debt,
36:31 which is a philemon because a debt is deserved
36:35 to somebody who legally and justly ought to have it.
36:40 A workman receiving his pay is an obligation.
36:44 It's not a charis and charis is the etymological root
36:49 for grace, but it is the same root for thanks.
36:54 Wherever there is grace, there is praise.
36:57 Wherever there is grace, there is thanks.
37:01 And the reason I don't talk about you
37:04 is because I'm giving God too much praise
37:07 for what he's done for me.
37:10 I feel something moving me here.
37:15 I need a favor from the Lord.
37:18 I need his unmerited favor.
37:22 I need you to look at me, Lord,
37:24 and just completely obliterate my sin.
37:28 You got to douse me in the blood of the lamb.
37:32 I mean, dip me up deep in order for the devil
37:36 to know I'm clean.
37:39 I feel the Holy Ghost in here.
37:41 That's why David, in his deep repentance
37:45 for the awful things that he did,
37:48 could not change, followed by a blissful peace
37:52 that was poured out in his spirit.
37:55 Soft music couldn't bring him up out of this.
37:58 A bottle of gin couldn't help him.
38:01 I wish I could preach to some folk.
38:04 Cocaine couldn't help him, because once the conviction
38:08 of the Holy Ghost moves down in your spirit,
38:13 you can't sleep at night.
38:16 I don't know about you, but when God begins to work on me,
38:22 I can't sleep at night.
38:24 If I did something to somebody, I
38:28 got to find a way to pick up my phone and say, I'm sorry I did
38:33 it, because can't nobody convict you like the Holy Ghost.
38:41 But when the Holy Ghost begin to talk to you,
38:44 you can't shake it off.
38:47 The servants of David were worried
38:50 that David was going to hurt himself,
38:53 because he wouldn't eat.
38:55 He wouldn't do anything.
38:57 But he hollered in the midst of his pain.
39:00 But finally, God snatched the child.
39:04 And David got up from where he was.
39:07 He washed himself off.
39:10 He put on the best suit he could find.
39:14 And he got up and went down to the temple
39:18 and gave God the praise and the glory,
39:21 because God covered his sin and said, I'm not going to kill you.
39:28 Touch your neighbor and say, God ain't going to kill you.
39:32 Some folk want you destroyed because of what you have done.
39:38 But God told me to tell you, your life is not
39:43 in their hands.
39:45 And I have no joy in the death of anybody that's
39:51 outside of the household of faith.
39:54 So I heard David, when he talked to God,
39:58 he said, Lord, you can take my house.
40:01 You can take my car.
40:04 You can take everything around me.
40:07 But one thing I don't want you to take
40:11 is, Lord, don't take your Holy Spirit away from me.
40:17 Shake somebody's hand like you're going to shake it off.
40:22 Say, I can afford to lose everything I got.
40:27 But I cannot afford to lose the anointing
40:32 that God has placed in my soul.
40:36 I can afford to lose all the money I got.
40:40 But I cannot afford to get up in the morning
40:45 and don't feel the power of the living God.
40:50 I can't afford for folk to talk about me like a dog.
40:55 But I can't afford for God not to put his word down in me.
41:01 Because at the end of the day, it's
41:04 the power of his anointing that's
41:07 going to bring you up out of your circumstance.
41:10 And that's why I don't care how you messed up.
41:14 You must not give up.
41:16 Shake somebody's hand.
41:19 Said, it's been rough here lately, but I ain't letting go.
41:24 I'm holding on to the power of my God,
41:29 because I shall rise again.
41:33 I messed up, but I still feel that God is opening the door.
41:40 And all I want to tell him is, thou art my hiding place.
41:46 My enemies would have wiped me out when
41:50 they know I was down and out.
41:52 But you covered me.
41:54 Can I preach like I feel it?
41:57 Can I preach like I want to?
41:59 I feel the Holy Ghost touch your neighbor.
42:03 Said he covered me.
42:06 They would have wasted me.
42:08 They would have wiped me out.
42:10 But he covered me, covered me in my mess,
42:15 covered me in my test, covered me while my heart was broken,
42:20 covered me while they would destroy me.
42:23 He said, no weapon formed against me shall prosper.
42:30 I know his bright side, and I know his dark side,
42:34 and I'm still his God.
42:37 Every now and then, he would visit me
42:41 in the middle of my weakness and let me know I made a way.
42:48 I'll bring you out.
42:50 I'll show you the way.
42:52 I'll lift you up.
42:54 Somebody in here been tied up in a 10-year affair.
43:00 But God told me to tell you, I'll make a way.
43:05 I'll bring you out.
43:07 I'll remove your weakness and give you strength.
43:11 Somebody in here, the devil's been trying to kill.
43:16 But God told me, I'm going to strengthen you.
43:20 Then I'm going to pull the covers off and let you tell it.
43:24 I've been in the valley, but the Lord brought me out.
43:29 I've been in trouble, but the Lord made a way.
43:33 And I will not give up.
43:35 Look the devil in the face.
43:38 Put your foot on his head.
43:40 Said, yeah, I messed up.
43:42 But I will not give up.
43:44 I'm getting up again.
43:47 And I'm going to let the Lord know,
43:49 thank you for another chance.
43:51 Thank you for a second chance.
43:53 Thank you for a hundred chance.
43:56 Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
43:58 Thank you.
43:59 [APPLAUSE]
44:05 I feel him in here.
44:07 I feel him in here.
44:09 Touch two people real quick.
44:11 Say, messed up, but don't give up.
44:14 There's still a side of you that God wants to use.
44:19 He ain't through with you yet over that mistake.
44:22 He ain't through with you yet over that crazy decision.
44:26 No, you ain't going to get AIDS.
44:29 No, you ain't going to lose your mind.
44:31 No, you ain't going to lose your house.
44:33 He going to turn it around, set it straight.
44:36 And look, you praise him all.
44:39 [MUSIC PLAYING]
44:52 Oh, I feel him in here.
44:54 Yeah!
44:55 [MUSIC PLAYING]
45:08 Praise him.
45:09 [MUSIC PLAYING]
45:11 Glory!
45:12 [MUSIC PLAYING]
45:17 Somebody in here.
45:18 [MUSIC PLAYING]
45:29 [APPLAUSE]
45:53 Touch your neighbor and say, get up.
45:55 You can't change the past.
45:57 Get up!
45:59 [APPLAUSE]
46:12 Oh, I feel it.
46:19 Thou art my hiding place.
46:22 Thou have come past me about.
46:24 Do I deserve to be here?
46:32 [APPLAUSE]
46:50 It's a categorical no.
46:51 Do I deserve to stand in front of you?
47:01 Do I deserve the house I have, the car I have,
47:07 the clothes I wear?
47:11 Do I deserve the people who love me?
47:15 It's a categorical no.
47:18 But because he justified me freely,
47:25 I can walk here with you and lift my hands up and say,
47:29 Lord, I love you.
47:31 Because you did for me what I could not do for myself.
47:35 So to you that's in this place, I speak to you now and I say,
47:49 get up from there and believe in your heart
47:57 that he who died to save you is not
48:02 going to allow this mistake to destroy you.
48:09 For there's so much good that's in you.
48:14 You're such a wonderful person that you cannot allow
48:21 that mistake to cause you to throw in the towel.
48:28 Satan wants you feeling like this mistake is going
48:32 to scar you so horribly that the rest of your life
48:36 isn't worth living.
48:37 He's a liar.
48:40 He's a liar.
48:41 He's a liar.
48:47 What's going to happen here is you're going to get closer
48:51 to the God of your salvation, for you realize without him,
48:55 you can't make it at all.
48:59 To that soul that's here, and I want you to hold your seats.
49:03 I want to talk to the person in here that was so broken
49:11 and so self-condemnatory because of what you have done.
49:16 And I want you to come and say, Lord, I need you.
49:22 I need you.
49:24 I need you.
49:26 I need you.
49:27 Come on, young man.
49:29 Let him run on in here.
49:31 Come on.
49:33 Let him run.
49:34 I need you.
49:41 I need you.
49:44 I need you.
49:46 I need you.
49:49 I need you.
49:51 Those who need to be saved, just take them.
49:54 Those who need to be restored, just lay right where you are.
49:59 I need you.
50:01 I've given up on myself.
50:03 I felt like I can't go any further.
50:06 I feel like I'm just the worst person.
50:10 The Lord said, rise up.
50:11 Get up.
50:12 It's not over.
50:13 It's not over.
50:15 If they want to stay there, let them stay.
50:18 Rise up.
50:19 Rise up.
50:20 Rise up.
50:21 Rise up.
50:22 Rise up.
50:24 I've got to get back in the middle of it.
50:27 I've allowed this mistake to cause me to just feel like nothing,
50:33 and I'm trying to recover myself, but I just rose to tell you that God is
50:39 recovering you right now.
50:41 God is recovering you right now.
50:43 God is recovering you right now.
50:46 God is recovering you right now.
50:49 He said, I cannot lose you.
50:51 I will not lose you.
50:52 I will not lose you, but I will forgive you.
50:55 I will make you whole.
50:57 I will make you whole.
50:59 I will make you whole.
51:04 I want you to come give God the praise.
51:08 [applause]
51:11 Where are my elders?
51:12 [applause]
51:19 I want you to bow your heads all over this place.
51:24 Dear Father, in the name of Jesus, I honor you today,
51:31 and I praise you for your forgiving power.
51:35 I thank you, Lord God, for telling us what to say,
51:42 and we say now, Lord, pardon our sins.
51:46 We rededicate ourselves again to you, and we say now, Lord,
51:53 blood out our sins.
51:55 Wipe our transgressions away, and, Lord, don't do it mystically,
52:02 but cause us cognitively and intellectually to receive what
52:07 is just done.
52:09 For, Lord, I am convinced that if I don't forgive myself,
52:14 I have not received your forgiveness.
52:17 So now, Lord, as my brothers and sisters are gathered around this
52:22 altar with me, and many are going, Lord,
52:25 to the waters of baptism, the place of the new birth,
52:30 but as these are gathered around this altar with me,
52:33 I join in with them, and I say, Lord,
52:36 teach us to forgive ourselves, that when they rise up from this
52:41 altar, they will rise up knowing that everything behind them has
52:47 been blotted out, and I will live my life with power
52:51 and with victory, and I claim it in the name of Jesus.
52:56 I claim it in the name of Jesus.
52:59 Somebody give God the praise
53:01 ♪ You have been forgiven, you have been redeemed ♪
53:05 ♪ Now you just gotta let it go ♪
53:08 ♪ Just let it go, let it go ♪
53:10 ♪ You have been forgiven ♪
53:13 ♪ Let it go, let it go ♪
53:16 ♪ You have been redeemed ♪
53:20 (upbeat music)
53:22 (upbeat music)
53:25 (upbeat music)
53:28 (upbeat music)
53:30 (upbeat music)
53:33 (upbeat music)
53:35 (upbeat music)
53:38 (upbeat music)
53:41 (upbeat music)
53:43 (upbeat music)
53:46 (upbeat music)
53:48 (upbeat music)
53:51 [BLANK_AUDIO]