Turn your Bibles to 2nd Corinthians chapter 3 verse 5, and you're going to think that we planned out that song that they just sang, and that's not the case. But I will be mentioning from the Bible the verse that talks about that. But in 2nd Corinthians, if you will, in chapter number 3, I want to preach a message to you, but that teaches us, reminds us of our clearly that we have a great dependence upon the Lord Jesus Christ. not just in word or in concept or in theory uh... but we actually have a dependence on the lord himself chapter three of uh... there in uh... second corinthians and uh... look down at verse number five not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves okay but our sufficiency is of God. Our sufficiency is of God. Let's have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, I pray that you'd renew in our hearts the definite need that we have to be dependent, to live a life of complete dependency upon you. I pray, God, that if there's somebody here that doesn't know you, Savior, that this night they would come to you. But then the Christians here, that our hearts would be teachable, reachable, moldable, and Lord, that we would fall in love with you all over again for coming to church tonight. In Jesus' name, I pray. Amen. Amen. Now, Paul, in this passage in chapter three, he's brought to a place where he sort of has to vindicate his leadership. to the weak and carnal Christians of this church at Corinth. read through first and second corinthians especially first corinthians and what you're gonna find is paul is dealing with one problem after another problem after another problem after another problem which is good for us uh... because what we find out is that uh... you know when we people individually when we have problems when we awaken ourselves the bible might come up with a verse that says hey you've been doing it wrong uh... we could say hey you know what The church at Corinth had a lot of things wrong with them and God was still merciful and helped them. And but as a church, even as as a group of people, you know, all we are is just sinners saved by grace. Right. And we come together and God puts together a church and you say, well, we've got a long way to go. Amen. All of us do. And but you know what? took a carnal church here, which I believe we're ahead of that. I believe that right here, there's a group of people who are serious about loving the Lord and living for the Lord. But he took this group of people and he built what became a lasting church for many generations. And here we have him coming again and saying in verse number one, do we begin to commit again to commend ourselves or need we as some others epistles of commendation to you or letters of commendation from you. All right. He's saying, hey, I've got to vindicate myself as an apostle. And he shouldn't have needed that. They should have trusted his leadership. And but he comes in talking about this delicate situation. The tendency is to either speak too much about the apostle's personal abilities or to speak less of what he should assert concerning his authority over that particular congregation. And so he comes after declaring himself as an apostle. And they are His epistle. He said, I don't need somebody to write to you to tell you or to tell others that we are doing the right thing. He said, your lives, in verse number two and three, are the epistle that people will read. And our lives ought to do that. But in verse number five, he says the answer to it is to give all of the the direct relationship issues go to God and credit to God because we are nothing at the end of it all. We're just sinners saved by grace. Now, did you get that? What I said earlier is the same thing, that that's where we started. That's where we started. We're just sinners saved by grace. And you know where we've come to? We're still sinners saved by grace. And he says in this great verse, not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves. Now, that's an interesting passage because that passage deals with the word of meaning a place of origin. Like, where does your strength come from? Well, it's because there were just super Christians, right? No, Paul didn't even claim that. He said, you know, at the end of it, the strength I have, I don't even think about it. It doesn't even there's not a thought in my mind that it comes from me. It comes from the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's where we ought to live, to live our lives as we are living in this dirty world. We're living our lives on a continuous dependency upon the Lord Jesus Christ himself. The words there, to think, not that we are sufficient of ourselves, but to think. It means to impute, to compute, to reckon. But it's not possible to figure this thing out as if we're going to do it on our own. Isn't that helpful? Isn't it helpful to know that you can't live the Christian life? I think I think it's possibly the greatest truth about being a Christian is that God knows and he's expressed it over and over again that there's no way you can do it yourself. Our sufficiency is not of ourselves. He repeats it. And in that passage, as of ourselves, like it has any relation to this guy right here. that I'm living the kind of life God wants us to live. Now, as we go through life, our practical living is that we're always learning about things that God wants us to grow in grace. He wants us to move forward, learning and growing and experiencing God for ourselves. But it doesn't come from ourselves. But the great thing is in the answer of the verse at the end, but our sufficiency is of God, is of God. Our sufficiency. Now that word but there is one of the strongest conjunctions that you could use. And it means that there is a contrast. Our sufficient, like we could do this ourselves. And then a strong contrast, but. God is our sufficiency. Our sufficiency is of God. If you wanted to have a theme in your life to be successful. This might be a great one. This verse first brought my attention. This is an old sermon that I have, and the Lord led me to preach this tonight. But it was first brought to my attention because I had a band teacher, the one that taught me how to play the trumpet, who's gone home to be with the Lord. He worked at a Bible college in Canada, a pretty well-known Bible school, and he said that the student body had chosen this verse as their theme verse, our sufficiency is of God. Now, that's a great theme. If you want to pick a theme for your family, you want to say something about your Christian faith, you can say this truth, that what we have, our sufficiency, is of God. Now, it should be obvious, really, almost redundant, but certainly a reality. Christians, we should not need to be reminded That we're not doing this ourselves. That our sufficiency is of the Lord. But self-reliance, get this, is the enemy, is the enemy of our Christian lives. As soon as we feel in our hearts, I've got this. I can do this. And in 1 Corinthians 10, verse 12, it says, let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. Right? We have this idea as soon as we get to this point where we say, Lord, I got this part. What are we asking for? We're asking for failure. Why? Because we are not sufficient. Our sufficiency is of God. And so this Christian life is meant to constantly be reminded to live and dwell in a spirit and in an actual reality that in order to succeed, we have to constantly depend upon Jesus Christ. Because he is sufficient. I'd like to give you a sermon tonight entitled Dependency and Sufficiency. Dependency and Sufficiency. I'd like to begin with a point of how we are dependent upon God himself. I think when you ask this as a question, you say, how are we dependent? We need to remember that our idea of dependency is related to insufficiency. And independence is related to sufficiency. Someone who is sufficient of himself, and that's only God, is also independent. But somebody who is insufficient is constantly dependent upon the one who is sufficient. Now, I'm not trying to be confusing. The example here is that our children, we call them our dependents. Why? because they are insufficient to meet their everyday needs. Right? I mean, remember when the kids are real little, can they drive themselves to work? Can they earn a living? Can they provide? Can they even make a stable home at that point? And no, that's why we are given this situation that the Lord enabled us to have 20 years or something like that with our children, because it takes that long to prepare them to become independent in this world. Independent from us, but not independent from God. God is sufficient and he's independent. In what way? Now I want you to think about this. He's independent in the area of being self-sufficient. Very different from us. In Psalm, it tells us in the 50th Psalm, verse 10 through 12, he says this, for every beast of the forest is mine. and the cattle upon a thousand hills. We like to say that. We have a song to that effect. I know all the fowls of the mountains, he says, and the wild beast of the field are mine. Now get this. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee, for the world is mine and the fullness thereof. A God is independent of his creation. That's called the self-existence of God. He is independent for His existence. Before there was a world, God was God and He's unchangeable. He has never changed. God has always been the same. He's immutable. That's what that means. And being that way, God is totally sufficient of Himself. Important idea. He said, if I were hungry, I wouldn't tell you. He wouldn't need to. Because he said, if I were hungry, every beast of the field, every fowl of the air, he says, not only are they mine, but I know where they're at. Even if you and I wanted to go get one, we'd have to go take our rifles and go hunting. The idea of hunting is we don't know where they are. God knows where they are. And he feeds the fowls of the air. And he said, hey, if I was hungry, if I were hungry, I wouldn't even tell you. Because he's totally independent and sufficient. How about us? In contrast, we could not be sustained for 30 seconds, maybe a minute. Try to go to outer space and take off your space suit. How sufficient are we? We're depending on this creation. Without oxygen, without food, without water, without anything of that nature, everything about us screams dependency, insufficiency. But God is different. He is sufficient and independent in that He is self-sustaining. He's also concerning the issue of creation. Now, sometime you can read this. The book of Job is the oldest book in the Bible. You wonder which one was written first. It was actually the The book of Job, which is part of it, it's fit in there where it belongs. The Bible is not arranged in chronology of when they were written, but these books are arranged topically, so that we have the law at the beginning, and then the history, and then Hebrew poetry, which begins with the book of Job, which is actually the first book that is written. Somewhere in time, you can go to chapter 38 and begin in verse number four, and it goes all the way to chapter 41, verse 34, where the Lord finally speaks. And the nature of his language is, he tells Job, he says, where were you when I made all of this? And he talks about in great speed when I put the stars and put them into outer space. Where were you when I set the course of the water and the whole circuit of the water? Where were you when I set the boundaries of the waters of the sea? Where were you when I did all of this? Indicating that God is totally independent and sufficient. And man, again, You know, he comes to a place like, did God stop to ask you? Did he stop to ask your opinion? He asked Job, did I stop and say, hey, what do you think I should do over here? I'm the architect of the universe. God is independent and he is sufficient. Job's response after this, when he got down to chapter 42, he says, I am I am lower than the low. I am worthless. I am. I am. I repent in dust and ashes. when he realized how big God is and how little we are. In fact, it is Matthew chapter 6 verse 27 tells us that we can't even add one cubic to our stature. Yet God made all of this in six days simply by the word of his mouth. Think about this. God is independent and sufficient. And we are dependent and insufficient. He's also this way about swearing, and I think this is important to see. Turn over to Hebrews, if you will. You might want to put something, if you have a bookmarker or something, in the way in that text in 2 Corinthians. But go down to the sixth chapter of Hebrews, and I love this chapter in all the Bible. It's got some really important things, like the end of chapter five. But chapter six, verse 13, for when God made a promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no greater, he swore by himself. Isn't that amazing? I mean, most men, and he goes here in verse number 16, he says, for men verily swear by a greater, and an oath for confirmation is to them the end of all strife. He says, I swear by what? By the temple, or by the altar, or by the, by the name of God, the God of heaven. This is not an issue of whether you should do that, but he's saying, hey, in many, many circumstances, a swearing of an oath is the end of controversy. But he said when God, when he had a chance to swear to Abraham, what does he swear? He swears to him that I'm going to make you a mighty nation and that all the nations will be blessed because of your children, your offspring. What is God saying? He said, when I could find none other greater to swear by, he said, I swear to Abraham an oath and I swear by myself. What an expression of self-sufficiency that God says, I don't need anybody else. My name is enough. What what an awesome statement. In confirming his promises in the Old Testament, he often used the phrase, as I live, saith the Lord. What was he doing? He was saying, as I live, these are the basis of my promises. An ever living, never changing, almighty God. He's independent and he's sufficient. He's also that way in salvation. In Galatians, the Bible tells us, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, for by the works of the law there shall no flesh be justified. So you think about what could you do to save yourself? You say, Pastor, I couldn't do anything. Right, because all of your good works, the Bible says, are none, none of them could ever take away one single sin that you've already committed. So how sufficient are you in saving yourself before you can get saved and really know you're going to heaven to have that remission of sins? The first thing you have to come to is knowing in your heart, I can't save myself. But what about God? Well, if you're in Hebrews, look at chapter one. Back up to chapter one of Hebrews and you'll see an interesting passage. to compare us to God. In verse number three, who being in the brightness of His glory and the express image of His Son, of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. What did Christ do in contrast to our inability to save ourselves? So we are definitely insufficient for salvation. What about God? He's so sufficient that he said, I did it by myself. An important point to the Trinity. Are you realizing that? He's claiming that He saved. He brought salvation. But who saved? In other passages of the Bible, you could say that God brought salvation or that the Holy Spirit brought salvation. He was quickened in the Spirit and so forth. But the fact is that Jesus said, here's how I am. I don't need anybody's help. You and I, if we said that, we'd be considered very proud and cocky. You know why? Because we can't. You can't deliver on that promise. But God is not pride for God to say that because he can deliver, always will do what he has promised to do. God is completely sufficient for salvation. How much sufficient is he? Can he save you partway to heaven? Does he need your help? The Bible says when he by himself purged our sins. So he doesn't need us at all, does he? That's the problem with those that have a have a trouble about working for salvation. There's a feeling like, well, when you realize you've sinned, I've got to make up for my sin. And God says there's nothing you can do. And because of that, I did everything that you need to have done for salvation. I have done everything you need when I by myself purge. Your sins. He is sufficient and he is independent and we are dependent and we are insufficient. Anything he wanted to do, listen to one more verse Psalm 135 verse number 6. 135 6. I listen to what it says whatsoever the Lord pleased. That did he in heaven. And in Earth. And in seas. and all deep places. Amazing, isn't it? Can you do whatever you please? No, there's a lot you have to do just to be able to live in this world. You have to get out of the cold weather to ultimately survive. You have to provide food and sustenance and water. You have to have everything handed or given or earned or work. Everything has to be done. But not God. God says, whatever I want to do. And not just where we are limited, but God says, in heaven, whatever God wants to do, in earth, in the seas, and all deep places. And we can explore some of those places, but there's a lot we don't understand. God says, not only do I understand it, I'm in total control over it. I do whatever I please. So when we look at this as a question and say, How are we dependent upon the Lord? We realize that we are very, very dependent. Secondly, not only as a question, but as an exclamation, how we are dependent with an exclamation point at the end. When you see that God in His immensity is promising you the power to do His work. I'm talking about when you're filled with the Spirit of God. that you realize He is your all. He's everything you need, everything that you should be searching for. People, we spend a lot of time doing things absurdly, living for the possessions of this life. Well, I want a bigger house, better pay, better education for a better job, for a better pay so you can drive a better car and have a bigger house and have blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. when actually everything you need is wrapped up in Jesus Christ. Everything you could ever hope for is in this great Savior. How big is He? He can do anything, but He will do everything He promised to do. You can't find a promise that God made that applies to us that He will fail at doing. The fact is the Bible has clear language about the fact that once he has promised to do something, he cannot deny himself. He said, what if I don't believe? Hey, God says it's not based on your faith. He said, God made a promise and his promises will be true. He said, but I don't feel it. Have you ever felt like you weren't saved? Come on. Be honest. I don't want to pretend things. I want to be honest with you. You ever get into sin and your sin has made you feel so far away from God that you say, man, I don't even feel like I'm saved. And that's the feeling in your heart. But God says, hey, you want to know something? When I saved you, I saved you for a permanent way. And what I promise to you doesn't depend on what you feel today. It's based not on this insufficient human life. but it's based on a very independent and sufficient Lord Jesus Christ. The very opposite of dependency can be called self-reliance. And when we should be encouraged, we should encourage our dependency on God, but most of the time we find ourselves trying to do things on our own. Christians are not living depending upon God, We have God's power, we have his protection, his provisions, his purpose, his passion, but we do not use God's power in our life. We get into this feeling like we are superhuman and say, hey, I can handle this. I do not need to read my Bible this morning. You don't? I do not need to pray this morning. Why? Because I can handle life. Do you see where I'm going with this? And we feel like, man, I can teach my Sunday school class. You can? I don't need to depend on God? Christian, listen to me. You got children? I can raise my children. Really? How's that working for this world on their own? See, this self-reliance is where a person crosses a line. And you know what? I know the devil's a liar, and he's sneaky. He's involved in this. He's watching what we can't see, and he sees when we cross that line, and we're sort of like, standing there, like, I'm the super Christian, you know? We're self-reliant. And the devil sort of looks at you like, boy, is he dumb. And you know what he does? is that sometimes He lets you do okay to encourage this self-reliance. I mean, you go through the day and you come to the end of the day and you say, Pastor, yesterday I did not read my Bible, I did not pray, and even if you did, you did not surrender your will. Remember, praying as a Christian means that every morning you stay there until your will is given over to God. You are not depending on God if you're just playing games, reading a prayer list to God. Your heart has to be in this where you surrender to the Lord himself. That's dependency. But if you say, yesterday I got up, I didn't read my Bible, I didn't pray, and you know what? Everything went okay. Hey, the bills are paid, nobody shut the lights off, we didn't have an earthquake, I didn't crash my car, I didn't come down with some kind of sudden heart attack. Because the devil knows that encouraging that self-reliance is a real tool against a Christian. Sometimes he'll let you go a few days. But the every day, every moment that you walk away from a dependence on the Lord Jesus Christ is walking away from the protection, walking away from the promises, walking away really from your purpose that you're here, you're walking away from everything God has for you, and you don't realize you are so insufficient, it's like going out to outer space without any oxygen. Sooner or later, you're gonna fall flat on your face. So Christians, I have said many times, pastor, I've tried. You know, I've tried that thing about praying every day and surrendering my heart to you. And man, I try and I fail and I try and I fail. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. There's a point where we leave that place of dependency and are realizing our insufficiency upon God. Our reliance upon God and we rely upon self. I can, whatever you do for a living, I can turn that ratchet and fix that car engine. I can weld, I can do my office work, I can teach that class, I can do whatever it is that you do for a living. And that state of self-reliance is the enemy of a Christian. And sometimes the devil rewards you, he encourages you. Come on, step away from And you're like, oh, it went all right. I didn't need to tithe that week. Look at all that pastor. He told me if I didn't do what's right with God, that God was going to bring his chastening upon my life. Ha! Look what he thinks he knows. And he's encouraging all the while your independence, your feeling of self-reliance. I can do this on my own. When we see in just logical contrast that what God is, what we are and what God is, we are dependent, we are insufficient. God is independent and he is sufficient in himself. He needs nothing from us and we need everything. But yet we walk away into this really dangerous place of self-reliance. Self-reliance only produces bad things. It doesn't do any good. It produces a Christian who is without God's strength against sin. You know, all the promises that we have that God says, I will strengthen you. Yea, I will be with you. What you do when you walk into self-reliance, you say, I don't guess I don't need that today. I can do it. You know, we play this charade and we believe the kind of the game that we're playing. We tell ourselves and we believe the lie that says, hey, I got myself right here where I'm at. I picked myself up from my own bootstraps and I am on my way because I'm a self-made man. There are no self-made men. There are no such thing as a Christian who is self-made. You are either failure or you are by the grace and mercy of God where you are today. And you're going to continue to go the right way if you depend upon him. It produces independence or self-reliance, produces Christians who serve God by their own strength. Now I'm going to tell you a secret here. You know why the Lord is blessing our church? I mean, this is January, and it's been since September that every week somebody has come to profess the Lord as their Savior, or they've been baptized, or they've joined the church. Every single week since sometime in September. Now listen to me. Do you know how many churches would long to have that kind of blessing? And I'm going to tell you, it isn't because of me as a pastor. It isn't because of us as a church. It is all because of a great God who says, I'm longing to reach people. I love the lost and I want people to come to Christ. It is not because of us. But you try to do it on your own, pretty soon you're going to find yourself empty. Sitting in an auditorium where the altar hasn't been cried on for a long time. where people haven't responded to the gospel and it's come to the place where people say, hey, it's normal to come to church and to go home and be nothing affected in my life, to be no different than when I came in. I believe God's people should come to church ready for God to speak to their heart and to give them the word and to go out a different person in God's direction. That'll happen if you have a church that is not depending upon the Lord Jesus Christ. It is the secret of this ministry. A self-reliance produces Christians who lack direction from God. People make decisions and they find all sorts of spiritual sounding words to cover themselves. Well, I believe the will of God is leading me whatever. And I'm not trying to say God does lead. He does lead. But self-reliance produces a false path. And people claim that God did speak to them. And you know what that is? That's taking God's name in vain. It's really listening and saying, God spoke to me. I need to go get drunk. Obviously, we don't believe that. Are you watching me? But in the same way, people claim that God spoke to them so that they can go do what they want to do, really not being led by God. And you know, when they come and they say, Pastor, it's God's will, what are they saying? Well, what am I supposed to say then? It's not God's will? What they really mean sometimes is, pastor, you can't argue with this. I don't want your opinion. I don't want, and hey, that's your, I'm just a man. A man who prays for each one of you every morning. A man who begs God that he would give you his best for your life. But ultimately, just a man. And I'm here, the Bible says that you have a pastor and teachers for the perfecting of the saints. I'm just a man, but I'm called of God to help your life. People come in and say, God said to do that. All right. I can't say a word. Go and do it. See, I hope you're right with God. But self-reliance produces this idea that you're going to walk out ahead of God and not in the path of God. Your direction is not really coming from the Holy Spirit, it's coming from a person's personal desires. They change, people change locations. They say, well, like pastors do this. Let me pick on the pastors. Pastor, well, you know, the Lord's moving us on to other places. No, they just wanted to live in Florida or something. You know what I'm talking about? Well, the Lord has moved us on. We love you folks, but the Lord has moved us on, yeah, to a church like of a pulpit with 500 people in the church to say, well, this became a stepping stone like somebody's career path. The ministry is not about a career path. The ministry is about giving our lives to God and God, wherever you want me to go and whatever you want me to do, then you spend my life how you want. Pastors do that. So the first point today, let me reiterate that for you. The first point today, I worded it how we are dependent upon God. The second point, in what way God is sufficient. Our sufficiency, if you go back to that passage in your mind, you don't even have to turn there, but it said, but our sufficiency is of God, first of all, in temptation. Listen to this verse, there hath no temptation taken you. It's 1 Corinthians 10, 13. I quoted verse 12 earlier. Wherefore, let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. Verse 13 says, there hath no temptation taken you, but such as is common to man. But God is faithful. who will not suffer or allow you to be tempted. Above that you are able, but will with a temptation also make a way of escape that ye may be able to bear it. Wouldn't you like to be able to face temptation and know that you can bear the temptation or the trials? Both of those are within that meaning and context. Wouldn't you like to know, hey, the devil's not going to hit me with anything that through God's strength I cannot bear. But God says, I've made a promise to you. God is sufficient in trials or temptations. I'm not going to allow anything to happen to you that is too much for me to sustain you through. So then you feel like giving up. You say, man, it's all going wrong. I feel like the end is near and I can't make it. Yes, you can. Because it's not you. You're depending on God and God made a promise to you. I will not allow you to be tempted above that you are able. You can bear it because of God's promise. Not because you're self-reliant, but the opposite, because you realize your insufficiency and you look to the God who is completely sufficient and say, I have nothing in myself, but through God, I can conquer every temptation and every trial. Now that's a joy. Isn't that good news? Aren't you like waiting for some good news? Did you get on to whatever source you listen to your news and get some good news today? You come to church and man, I'll tell you, there's some really good news in a dark world that has nothing but bad news and they're blowing up spy balloons and all of this kind of stuff. And you say, man, a war could be near. They could react incorrectly. Yes. Yes, yes, it can happen and it might happen, but listen, even if it does happen, God says He'll never put us through something that He cannot lead us through. You don't have to worry. You don't have to be afraid. You serve a God who is our sufficiency is of God. You say, Pastor, I can't overcome this one temptation. That's what our Saturday night class is all about. Overcoming a single problem. Man, this sin's got me by the throat. And God, I don't think I can make it. I can't do it. You're right. You can't. You're insufficient. You are dependent. But we serve a God who made a promise to you. There is no temptation taking you. He said, but God is faithful. He said, I'm going to take care of you. I referred to it earlier, but remember the story of Job, how God came and brought the attention of Satan to Job. Have you considered my servant Job, how he fears me and he does what's right? And he said, but you've built a hedge around him. You won't let me touch him. Think about that. Think about the protection of God that he's taken his children that are saved people. This is why you need to be saved if you're not saved, because he's put a hedge around you and said, hey, devil, hey, you see that line? You can't come anywhere closer than just that line. Why? Because you serve an omniscient God and an omnipotent God who says our sufficiency is of Christ. What a great God. He is sufficient in temptation, also in service. Philippians chapter 4 tells us in verse 13, I can do all things, how? Through Christ, which strengtheneth me. Now I know, I realize my insufficiency and my dependence. I realize that I cannot serve the Lord as I ought. The things that Debbie and I have been through over the years would have crushed us normally. But with the power of God, God has turned the dark things in our life to be great shining lights. Things that we thought were over became the very things that built and made our children what they are today. You know what, as a parent, it might seem dark at times. Trust in God. I can do all things. Why? Because our sufficiency is of God. In John chapter 15, we know the verse that says, for without me, you can do nothing but with him. Look out, nothing can stand in his way. Amen. That's good news for you, friend. He's also very sufficient in prayer. He says in Jeremiah 33 verse 3, a verse I love to quote, call unto me and I will answer thee and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not. Our God can do anything. One great writer on prayer wrote this following quote. He said, if it be true then that God's omnipotence is placed at our disposal, We are responsible for its exercise through prayer as though we possessed it ourselves. That's a thought. Take that home and think about it. Sufficiency, independence of God. He says, call unto me and I'll do great things for you. If you weren't here for Sunday School, please get a chance to listen to it this morning. You know, we're talking about the need of Christians to know how to pray. If God's plan is, hey, the things that you need, you have not because you ask not or you ask amiss. He's talking about God's plan is ask and you shall receive. If this is God's plan for you to have what you should have, then you have everything you need. Barring God and his abilities, you have everything you need except for what you aren't praying for. Maybe you're not praying right. You ought to know how to pray, and God is sufficient. Our sufficiency is of God. What about giving? Is God sufficient? Can He deliver us in this area of giving? We say, well, God led on my heart. Did He really lead on your heart? You've given your tithe, and then you have your offering. Now listen to me. You say, but I don't think it can be done. Good. You're insufficient, and you're dependent. God is sufficient. Is He sufficient? Did he tell you to give what he told you to give? All right. I'm not I'm not trying to play. This is the truth of the reality of what we're saying. It comes down to dollars and cents. It comes down to what's in our pocket. You say, Pastor, here's the bills. Here's my paycheck. And I don't have money to tithe. Listen, you don't have enough money not to tithe. And I'm not talking, our needs are not, I don't depend on you. I'm not pumping you for your money. I'm telling you a Bible truth that is great is that if the all sufficient God, if we really know that he is sufficient and he says, hey, give this amount, guess what? You can bank on that. You can bank on it that he'll take care of you. And you go ahead and you write that check or you put that envelope together. You put it in the offering plate and you say, Pastor, I have given you talk to God about it. I've given what God told me to do. Then you'll see something. He will always be sufficient. God is sufficient in temptation and service and prayers and giving and in human infirmities. Human infirmities. Oh, you know, are you in 2 Corinthians 3? Why don't you go to chapter 10? It's just, I was going to just quote this, and you know, I always keep you here long. I promised that this morning. If you come tonight, I promise to preach a full-length message anyway, right? Chapter 10. I'm sorry, chapter 12. I was looking at it wrong. Chapter 12. Paul is facing a physical problem. We think it was his eyes. Because in Galatians, he said the Christians of Galatia in that region, some of them would, if they were possible, they would pluck out their own eye and giving it to him. I think it was a hint that he was having a blindness problem. He even talked later, he said, you see how large a letter, meaning in their language, the way they would write their epistles that he wrote, it wasn't a lengthy epistle, it was large letters, okay? Why? Because we think he was suffering from a blindness. Why would an apostle who's writing the scripture by the inspiration of God, wouldn't you think he'd be concerned about losing his eyesight? I think it would be devastating, especially at the time where he lived. And so he said, he called it a look at verse number seven. We're in second Corinthians 12, seven, unless I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh is what he called it. a messenger of Satan, to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure. For this thing I have assaulted the Lord thrice, that I might depart from me." Are you seeing what he said? He came to this place where he's losing, possibly, it's his eyesight, and he's come to the place where he's thrice. So, I don't think he just said, Lord, please, Lord, please, Lord, please. Well, I tried. He's a man of prayer. I mean, he probably went away for a season where he fasted and he prayed It was important because the next verse is what the ladies were singing about, and it's so key to our Christian faith. Look at verse, if you will, in verse number nine, and maybe you need to mark this in your Bible, okay? I know some people don't like to mark in your Bible, but this verse is an incredible verse. And he said unto me, the Lord's response to Paul, my grace is sufficient for thee. For my strength is made perfect in weakness. Then Paul says most gladly, therefore, would I rather glory in my infirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon me. This is an incredible passage of Scripture. But what God is saying is, no matter what you've had to deal with that you feel like, I can't. I can't. God says, That's just when I want to use you is when you're at the end of yourself. Do you ever come to the end of your abilities, the end of your paycheck, end of everything, your strength, and you say, God, I'm at the end of myself. What the Lord is saying here is that's a good place to start. I'm going to show you that I will do what you cannot do. And what did Paul do? Well, he turned the whole Roman Empire upside down. Remember, I mean, he crossed the I mean, the churches that were planted by the preaching of this apostle, though his life seemed to be at an end, he said, but I'm at the disposal of God. And God says, hey, let me prove to you that my grace is sufficient for you. You say, Pastor, I'm not a gifted preacher. Look, I'm not a gifted preacher either. And you say, I don't know if I can serve God. You'll be in a good company because I'll tell you what we need. We need people that would say, I can't do it, but God, I am available if you want to do it through me. Now that is going to require you to be continually dependent upon Jesus Christ. I always tell you that the things that have been good here in this church and the miracles we've seen have come really at the hands of God and not at all because of the efforts of this preacher. When I see miracles of God and then I'm honest with you about the fact that, hey, I believe in miracles, but I'm gonna tell you what I believe about them. They don't come from these hands. Now I've prayed and I've watched God do miracles, okay? They come at the hands of God. It's the greatest place to live. When you get to the end of the day, like a lot of Sundays, I come down, my wife knows, I come down after Sunday night and I've preached my heart out three times, sometimes at the nursing home, so four times. And I come to the end of the day and I say, man, I feel like a complete failure. And I'm human too, I go through that. And I say, but watch God do what he wants to do through such an insufficient person like me. and then I glorify God. At the end of that, you know what is not lifted up? Well, look at that pastor down there at that church. Hey, you can try. You'll find me running the other way. Some of you compliment me, right? And I appreciate that. You know what the greatest compliment you could say is, Pastor, that message really spoke to my heart. The message, God's Word, not the preacher. But God spoke, God used the work of His Word in your life. But some compliment, and I always say, well, praise the Lord, praise God. Because you know why? Inside me, I know, man, I didn't do anything. At the end of the day, I just say, God, if you could use this, what an honor to be used of God. And you know, that's the fact of that constant dependence that makes a Christian live in a realm that everybody else is wondering, how did they do it? How do they accomplish things for God? How do they raise their children for God? How do they reach the lost of this community in the world? And the answer is, we're not doing it. God's doing it through us. In every aspect of our life, we are dependent and God is sufficient. I mentioned to you how we are dependent. The second point was in what way God is sufficient. And I want to close with just a couple words on how to maintain that dependency. Turn over to James chapter four to a very familiar passage of scripture to us because the nature of our desire for revival as Christians, as a church, often brings us to this passage of scripture. But the first part of continually being dependent is to have a humble spirit. Humility is the key. Nobody here is in a race for prominence. Nobody here is saying, Pastor, make me, I don't know, the deacon of the church. No, I want deacons who say, if God wants me to do this, I will serve in the work that he's called me to do, but I know I'm nothing. I want people that walk with God in humility. And God is looking for that. Look what it says in chapter four, verse number six. But he giveth more grace, grow in grace. We need God's grace. It is grace is sufficient. It is not my power that's sufficient. But he says, literally, I give more grace to whom? Look at the rest of the verse. Wherefore, he saith, God resisted the proud, but give grace unto the humble. You can read, keep reading, submit yourselves, therefore, to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you when you're humble. It's power. Draw an eye to God and He will draw an eye to you. Cleanse your hands of your sinners, purify your hearts, be double-minded and be afflicted and mourn and weep and let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy into heaviness. That doesn't sound like, hey, I want a position to make me the Sunday school superintendent. Somebody asked me that when we first started the church when we only had like three kids. Yeah, hey, everybody can be. Just come in and watch. There's nothing to be a superintendent over. You know, We're not in a race to be somebody. Christianity is not about God rewarding you by making you some famous Christian or you know that we could name our ministries the Don Whitaker evangelistic ministry. Anything that's going to be good is going to be used because it's God that does it through us. And our our dependency in our insufficiency. is only answered in the greatness of God, meaning we'd better stay connected to the greatness of God, and it requires that you and I maintain a humility. You ought to really love humility. You know what I love about humility is that there's no expectations that I create to live up to that I fail. I say I'm a sinner saved by grace. You know what I am? I'm a sinner saved by grace. And when I get up here to sing and lead singing and I fail leading singing, I can say, well, I expected that because I'm just a sinner saved by grace. I say, well, you know, sometimes my, I have physical problems like you and I have. I have stomach issues or I have, I have, I get it, I get sick. Seems like I get a cold pretty easily. And I know all of you are like, okay, I'm going to see pastor and give him some whatever you got your remedies. All right. Now I'm not trying to make a creative problem, but I'm talking about the often these little afflictions that seem to get in the way. And I look at it and say, yeah, that's because I'm still only a sinner saved by grace. I'm still really a nobody. But God is everything to us. He is my strength. You want to overcome sin? Stay humble and walk with the Lord. You want to have a good family? Know who you are. You're just an insufficient sinner saved by grace. And stay dependent upon the Lord. The second part, by the way, look at verse 8. Verse 9, 10, 10, verse 10, one of the great repetitions of God, humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord and he shall lift you up. When God lifts you up, it's not on a false premise or a false pedestal. Boy, we have this desire to be thought of as great. Didn't you know this? It's like we want to be on a pedestal. Ultimately, we want everybody. We don't want anybody to bow down to us, but we want everybody to say, wow, he's like super Christian. You see him? He's got it together. He's got no flaws in his life. Look at him. Now listen, all of us want that. Don't look at me like I'm the only one. OK. I'm going to tell you, when God lifts you up, he's holding you. He's not letting you go on a pedestal. I think sometimes God looks at that and says, all right, go ahead and see if you can make it. And you won't. But when he lifts you up because of humility, he sustains you because he is always sufficient for every need. And lastly, not only humility, but I call it anchoring, anchoring yourself close to God, not far away, close to God. The tide of human weakness. And emotions sends us closer and farther from the Lord, like the ebb and flow of a vessel that's anchored in a harbor. The ebb and flow, it draws us closer. What is that? Well, our emotions do affect us. Frankly, I sometimes get up in the morning and I'm like robust in my emotions to be close to Jesus. And then sometimes I wake up saying I'm only robust if I can have three cups of coffee. What is that? That's human weakness and emotions. It's the reality. If somebody comes to you and says, hey, I'm going to tell you how you can wake up every morning shouting glory to God and have all of this. Sometimes some of that is our emotional condition that's sometimes affected by how much sleep and how good you slept or what did you eat before you went to sleep. You know what? It's going to be like an ebb and flow, where your feelings affect that. So what do you need? Well, if you're going to stay close to the Lord, you better put an anchor out the ship. Are you following me? You say, I'm going to have an anchor. What kind of anchors? You should have one. Not just one. I don't like just having one anchor. Some people say, well, that might tangle the ship. I don't care what it does to the ship. I'm making up the story as I go, right? And if I make up the story, I can define it, OK? And so I'm saying I put out an anchor and on the anchor it says faith. I believe God even when I don't feel like believing Him. And I let down the anchor. You know what it does? Keeps me close to that place I'm supposed to be. I look around and I find another available anchor and I look on it and it says the Bible. And you know a long time ago I made an anchor and I said I'm going to read my Bible every single morning. I don't care what it takes, how early I have to get up. And to make some of you feel better, I'm a morning person. So I get up, I get up, I wake up naturally, five o'clock or somewhere between five and six every day if you don't set an alarm. That's not a gift, that's just, I go to bed about 10.30 at night, I'm like, my brain is like jello, I can't think anymore. All right. And so I've made me maybe I've made myself that way, but I get up in the morning. You might say, Pastor, it's so hard for me because I'm not a morning person. Hey, it's a battle you have to face. But in order to stay close to Christ, because of my natural tendencies to sway, I found it an anchor that says every morning I'm going to read my Bible. What does it do? It corrects me. The Bible is good for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect or matured, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. The reason I can keep going is because I've dropped an anchor off the side of the boat. My life can drift just a little bit back and forth because of my emotional status. But I know that I'm anchored because I believe God. And out the other side is this Bible reading. I'm anchored. I'm just stuck right there. And then I put down an anchor of prayer, real fervent prayer. I got a meeting with the Lord every morning. I've got to pray. Real prayer. You know what you ought to decide in your heart? Say, I'm going to put down some anchors in my family. I'm going to say, I'm going to pray. I'm going to believe. I'm going to read. You know what another anchor? You're doing it. You're here tonight. Yeah. I mean, I've seen people do that, that fail and they're faithful to church, but I've never seen anybody succeed who's not faithful to church. They say, but pastor, you're just trying to get us all to go to church. Listen, did you ever stop to think that I wouldn't even, if I didn't believe that church three times a week was really important, do you think I would even have it? Why should I be a waster of your time? Why not, like a lot of churches, they cut out the midweek service. And man, I'll tell you, there comes a point where I have to ask some pastors, like, what do you do all week? I preach approximately five times every week. And every time I preach, it's between five, I don't know, five and seven hours of preparation per sermon. And if you're only preaching one sermon a week as a pastor, I have to ask the question, what do you do with the rest of your time? I mean, I'm working like that and then I'm visiting and I'm working with people and administrating and doing the things around the building. Hey, you know, it might be easier. I have nothing in my schedule that requires, hey, you're a pastor, you have to have Sunday school, Sunday morning, Sunday evening, Thursday evening, midweek service. This is what you have to do. The Bible doesn't say that. The Bible leaves it up to us. So then why don't you make it easier? Because I put an anchor out. You know, Sunday, is a great day. You come away from Sunday, Monday morning, you get up and go to work and you're like, man, God spoke to my heart. But by Monday afternoon, when the boss is screaming in your face and things are going all wrong and you're walking away from all that and your heart is twisted by the the incompetence of this world and the evil of this world. And somewhere in those days in the middle of the week, you need to come back away from that. Come into God's presence. Lock all that out. Pour your heart out to God. Be spoken of the Word of God into your heart through the messages so that you can say, hey, I'm fighting a battle and you can renew that. But you want to stay close to the Lord and remain in His sufficiency? Don't miss church. I'm not trying to just fill the church roles or keep people coming to church. I'm talking about your own strength. Don't miss. People miss. I think, you know, if you're sick, you ought to stay home. Amen. Don't bring it here and spread it all around. Amen. I believe in that. But I think that some people walk to the mirror like tired and they look up and say, I'm sick. I'm going back to bed. You ought to at least have more urgency to get to church than to work. Because God's blessings should be more important than the money. We know that theoretically, but when we act, Well, I'll just show up to church next week. We do that. We say what we're saying, but you wouldn't miss work. And you're saying, hey, the dollar is more important than Jesus. I know we don't believe that when we think about it, but the devil deceives us to overlook the fact that it's only three times. If you were a drunk, the drunk has to go get drunk every night of the week if he can find money to spend. The devil is a wicked taskmaster that says, hey, I own you. You come every night. God says, hey, to help renew yourself, to help give you the strength you need, I've put together a schedule, three days, Sunday morning, Sunday night, three services, and Thursday night. Not very much when you really think about it. It's like one person talked about tithing. I was discipling him, and I didn't know what he'd think about tithing. I got to that place where in my devotions with him, I was saying, hey, the Lord talks about tithing. And he said, Pastor Whitaker, don't you worry a bit. Tithing to the church is much cheaper. He said heroin costs a lot more. Where I was in sin was a lot more expensive than what the Lord asked me to do. Because he's asking for your good. Anchored. And then service. Wouldn't there be a great feeling of having no strings attached, nobody depending on you, and you could just go float and do what you want? Of course, your life wouldn't have a lot of meaning, but there's a feeling like all responsibilities are gone, no bills to pay. Could you imagine that? I think there's some people that live like that. But a healthy Christian, now get this, in your service for God, you have people that are depending upon you. That's an anchor. That's an anchor. I told one of the fellows at lunch today, hey, they were saying, maybe I'll come, maybe I won't come tonight. I wonder, maybe should I come tonight? Should I come? You think I should? We laughed about it, but the fact is people are depending on that. Do you understand? You need to get to the place where your service for God has people that are depending on you. Why? It's another anchor. So the emotions, the winds of our emotions, I'm really tired. I don't feel like being hot for God. Listen, real revival isn't depending on your emotions. Real revival is coming to God, being right with God and doing it even if your emotions disagree. Now, what's great is your emotions are good if they're good and right. They follow you. And man, it's just a blast to serve the Lord Jesus Christ. But as those winds push you this way and your feelings pull you this way, Out this side, out that side, out that side of my ship, I've got an anchor every direction. You know where I'm gonna go? Not very far from Jesus. And that is how you stay dependent upon the Lord. It's this living your life knowing who I am. I'm just a sinner saved by grace. But knowing who God is, an all-sufficient God who made great promises to me. And that you and I We are living a life of completely trying to be completely dependent on the Lord Jesus Christ. How are you living today? Are you depending on Him? Are you finding yourself self-reliant? This message is to encourage, as I started out, to encourage a life lived depending on Jesus Christ. So ask God right now, is the Holy Spirit speaking to you about how you are not anchoring yourself, how you're not recognizing God's great sufficiency, and you're trying to live on your own. So let's all stand together with your heads bowed and your eyes closed. Have a time of invitation where you can come and you belong down here at this altar and say, Lord, I want to begin the life of dependency Upon you, I want to be what you want me to be through you and him through you, God living through us. It's a great place to be. It is a great place to be.