00:00
00:00
00:01
Transcript
1/0
Man, anytime I'm in someone else's
church, I forget how a normal church functions with just not
having a pastor that takes an hour to get to the preaching.
If you know Adrian Dominguez, he preaches through the song
service, he preaches through the announcements. He preaches
through the special, and then an hour and a half later, church
starts. That's okay, you can tell him I said that, I'm okay
with that. But, no, in somebody else's church, it always seems
like it goes by super, super fast, because I forget that's
how normal churches do it. But yeah, like I said this morning,
I'm not gonna be super long-winded today. The food smells too good
back there. 45 minutes maybe, 45, 50 minutes,
something like that. Not as long as your pastor, Tyler. I do look forward to going down
to the blowout. Preaching it this February. So I'm gonna try
to make it down there if If my schedule works out, I would love
to go down there and hear him preach he like I said he's been
a friend of mine for over a decade and I like to have friends that
are doing something for the Lord. You know, I like to have friends
that are preaching in places and being a blessing, and I know
he will to that church down there. He didn't even tell me he was
preaching the blowout. I had to find out through Brother Donovan.
He was just at Adrian Dominguez Church, maybe last week, the
week before, I don't remember, but he was telling me, he's like,
yeah, I asked that Campbell, He's like, you've got that big
guy who's six foot five, and I say, hey, you want preach to
blow out? He starts shaking like a little girl. He just starts
shaking. And he's like, that gave me such
a kick. That big tall guy had to put
his hands on the table because he was so scared. So it's going
to be good. I couldn't imagine. I could imagine
that would be the scariest time of my life. So anyways, Romans,
Chapter 12, we're going to start in Romans, Chapter 12. And I'm going to preach a message
on on something that we all have, and that's a personality. And
let me just preface this by saying there's this new stupid book
out there that some of these, even PBI graduates that are starting
to read, Living the Fearless Christian Life, and it's about
your identity in Christ and all that nonsense. And that is not
what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about you go
before God and you present who you are in your identity, and
then after that, the Christian life, as long as you follow who
you are, there's no struggles, there's no problems. And that's
what that book is laced with, is you go before God and He says,
you know what you are? You are a bold pastor. And you say, okay.
Now I've got to live as a bold pastor and with that I'll have
no problem walking in the Spirit. I'll have no problem being my
best. I'll have no struggles. One of these guys that actually
preached at Brother Peacock's church, he said that, he said,
the reason why some of you pastors are having a hard time is because
you're not really called. That is directly against scripture
though to say that You can't have struggles as a pastor. And
that's what he said from Brother Peacock's pulpit. And that lit
a fire under Brother Peacock. And rightfully so. So that's
not what I'm talking about. I am not talking about you yielding
your personality to the Lord and then all of a sudden life
is easy and you'll just walk in the spirit and there's no
problems. As a matter of fact, the opposite. The message I want
to preach is that God gives each person a personality and they're
all different. and you put that in a God's hand
and He can use it, you take it out of God's hand and you can
make a mess of it. In other words, the strengths that you have in
your personality can become a great weakness to you in your Christian
life. And that's what I want to preach on, and we all have
them. We all have different things about, about us that are just
come natural to us. And even if you don't feel like
it, there is something about you that you excel in. Maybe
not on a large scale, like some other people, like you can look
at these. I have a friend who always. beats himself down and
he talks about it. He says, man, I'm just not like
this guy. And he's a single guy still. I just can't get girls like this
guy. And I can't do this. And I'm not this. I'm not funny.
I'm too shy. I'm this. I'm that. And just
beats himself down all the time. And the truth is, no matter how
bad you want to be like somebody else, you're going to have to
be yourself. You're going to have to be who God made you.
You're going to have to be used as God wants to use you. And
that's all you can do. And you'll take, he'll give certain
individuals a certain portion, maybe a boldness, and he'll take
that boldness and he will just magnify that in that Christian's
life. And then this one over here, he may have some boldness,
but it's just not magnified as much as this guy's, but he'll
still use that boldness. So the point is you use what
God gave you, but every single one of us has something about
ourselves that God wants to use. and it's specific to the individual. naturally dynamic or charismatic
or whatever they are. And you may envy some of those
personalities and think, oh man, I wish I could just make people
laugh like that guy or whatever comes natural to them. And then
you have other personalities that are just boring. Annoying
I know some of those all right. There's there is a personality
out there and I Every time I come across somebody with that personality
It is annoying and that's the one to me that is like I don't
want to be around you for more than five minutes. I And I could
tell you what that is, but it's just, to me, that personality
just makes me just wanna get away and be around some other
people. But you know what? My personality is annoying to
some people. There's other people out there that look at my personality
and say, I don't wanna be around that guy. The truth is, though,
whether we find certain people annoying or not, God made us
that way. and were to be used as God made
us. And you'll have that, you'll
have those little things that you have. And they may sound
stupid, I have some that sound so stupid if you tell somebody
else, they'll be like, that is dumb. But to me, it's just something
that God gave me. One for me is I don't, I don't
really, I do okay in awkward situations. And I don't really,
get like super like, oh, that's just not appropriate. That's
just awkward. That's wrong. I'm standing there in a urinal
one time using the bathroom next to a guy. And I reached over
and I handed him a gospel track. And he said, Thank you. And he put it in and he's like,
what is it? And I started telling him, it's just about Jesus Christ.
And then I got out of the bathroom and we're talking and my mom's
like, my wife's like, did you get a guy track in the bathroom? And I
was like, yeah. She's like, that is not, you
shouldn't be doing that. I was like, it works for me though. You say, that's stupid. I know
it's stupid, but it works for me. That is my personality that
when it comes to some stupid situation like that, I don't
think, oh, I can't do this because that it just feels weird. It
doesn't bother me. So you know what I've seen? I've
seen God use that in weird situations. You have some things like that,
that you do for yourself, that is just a part of who you are.
And God says, I can use that. that's more than what he could
do in a different individual with your strength. We all have
them, we all have some strengths. And you'll see a personality
at a young age that will start to form. People in here who have
kids, you'll see that at one years old, you'll see, that kid
is gonna be a character with this. or that kid's gonna have
problems with that, or that kid's gonna have some issues with this,
or whatever it is. At a young age, you can see some personalities
developing. And I know that sometimes there's
tragedies that happen to young kids. And it can kind of shape
some things about them that will change. I get that. But with
that being said, there's still something about them that's individual
to them. and that they have. You know,
I remember my daughter, my firstborn, she's a stubborn little thing.
And right away, she was, from just to when she was able to
start crawling, she was the kid that would get her hand smacked.
get her hand smacked, get her hand smacked, get her hand smacked,
get her hand smacked, get her, and it just went on and on. She
was that kid. There was a, I remember when
we would put her to bed, and she had this thing, she didn't
want to go to bed, and so she'd reach her fingers under the door, and
we'd see her fingers come out, and she'd go, hi, like this,
and we'd say, go to bed, and then 30 seconds later, hi, mom,
Dad. And then I'd go in there and
I'd say, give her a little swat on the butt, and I'd say, go
to bed. She'd cry and she'd run to the bed. And then, not even
a minute later, those fingers come out again. You just see
them. I'd say, go to bed, and they'd
suck back in. I'd go in there and give her
a little swat. It got to the point after a week of that, to where
when I would open that door, she would hand me the paddle,
and then run over to the bed, bend over, and start crying,
because she knows she's getting a swat, and then I'd swat her
on the butt, and then she'd go to bed. And that went on for
over a week before she finally learned the lesson that, hey,
this is not playtime, it's bedtime. And you know what I've seen,
I saw with that? She's gonna have a hard time
submitting some time someday. That little girl, she is hard-headed. But you know what else I can
see? God can often use a hard head if it's put in the right
place. And with our personalities that
we have, we're gonna have to submit those to the Lord and
let the Lord use them. Because if we don't submit them
to God and put them in his hands, we will make a mess of things.
We will destroy some things. We'll make a complete wreck of
our lives if we try to use some of the strengths that we have
for ourselves. Now look at Romans chapter 12.
Look at verse 1. He says, I beseech you brethren
by the mercies of God that you present your bodies as a living
sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable
service. So as a Christian, your job is to submit your body to
Jesus Christ. That means Your personality,
that means your eyes, your ears, your characteristics, your looks,
everything about you is supposed to be submitted to the Lord,
so that as a living sacrifice, so that He can use it for something.
And that's what our job is as Christians. And now I just picked
out three random characters out of the Bible to say a few things
about their personalities and the way that they really made
a mess of things with them. But when they yielded it to the
Lord, how the Lord really used it. And they're just three random
characters. But before we go there, I just
wanna say also that God never justifies sin because of someone's
personality. That is becoming a thing to where
that's just so-and-so. That's so-and-so in the flesh
is what that is. That's so-and-so as a sinner is what that is.
Just because your personality is more prone to something than
somebody else's doesn't make it okay. You can't say, oh, he
has an addictive personality, so. There's no so that should
follow that. I don't care if he has an addictive
personality, that does not excuse the sin. We're all prone to different
things, but the thing we're prone to doesn't justify it. Well,
you know so-and-so, they just like to tell everybody's business.
That's called gossiping. That's called running your mouth.
That's called, according to James, setting a fire and causing a
mess. You know what a gossiping tongue
does? The Bible likens them to a fire that kindleth, and you
know what it eventually does? Yeah, I mean, I was up there in Alaska,
and we'd have those forest fires, and you would see hundreds and
even hundreds of thousands of acres that would burn up every
summer. And I remember there's one that I would drive by down
Chena Hot Springs Road, and you look down, and you got right
up to the road, and it was just black when I moved up there. About
the time I left Alaska, about 10 years later, that thing just
started to grow back and look green again. That's what a tongue
does. You will spread some stuff about
things that you shouldn't be spreading, and it's just like
a fire, it just goes and destroys. And it may take 10 years for
that individual to be able to recover from what you did. It
takes a long time for that thing to grow back before you can't
even tell that there's a fire there. So there's no excuse for
it. I mean, you look at Moses in the Bible. He was a great
man. Moses was used by God. The Lord put his hand on Moses
and said, I'm going to use, I'm going to choose you to lead the
children of Israel into the promised land. He never made it to the
promised land, but he led them for 40 years in the wilderness.
Moses was close to the Lord. Over those 40 years, he became
very close to the Lord. but he had an anger problem.
Moses one day looks at that thing and says, well, if you're not
gonna listen to me, I'm gonna kill you. That's what people
do in traffic now. You cut me off in traffic, I'm
gonna shoot you. That's an anger problem. Moses comes walking
down one day and says, I told you guys not to do that, and
he breaks those commandments. Something that God just gave
him. Moses says, I don't care if God doesn't speak to the rock.
I'm so mad, I'm gonna smack it. And he smacks it. And then he
doesn't get to go into the promised land because of that. That's
anger. You know what? God didn't even
excuse that in the man Moses, who is much better than you or
me. And God said, you don't go to the promised land now. As
good as Moses was, God still held Moses' sin accountable to
what he did. So there's no excuse for that.
And in anger, the Lord takes anger seriously. You have an
anger problem. You need to get a hold of your
spirit The by the problems talks about that about a man that has
control over his spirit is better than a man that take up the city
What that's saying is that you're better off being able to control
yourself. I Then if I put it this way,
if I could gather all the men in Divide, Colorado and say,
let's go, let's fight. And I go in there and I can take
that city by myself and go in there and just go through these
men, knocking them out, knocking them out, knocking them out.
And all the things over, whatever the population is, they're all
just laying down flat. And I just stand up in victory
and I just beat the whole city of Divide, Colorado. The Lord
says, yeah, that's great. But what's better is a man who
in that anger rises up. He says, knock it off and stop
it. And he puts it down. Better is
a man that controls his spirit than a man that takes the city.
The Lord takes that stuff serious, even though your personality
may be prone to it. It's not an excuse. Now, look
at 1 Kings 18. This is the first one that we're
going to take a look at. 1 Kings 18. And just like you, I also have
things that I look back, and I think sometimes, man, why did
I do that? Or why did I say that? Or why did I, you get done doing
something, you think, oh, I'm such an idiot, I just messed,
I just did that again too, or I did that, or whatever it is.
We all have those things about us to where we can look back,
and we're prone to use the good things about ourself that God
gives us, and we're prone to mess it up and use it for the
wrong things. and to make a mess of stuff.
But when you're in God's hands, He takes the individual and He
makes something out of them. When you present your body as
a living sacrifice to the Lord and say, Lord, this is who I
am, this is how you made me, now take me and use me. He tends
to do that. Look at 1 Kings 18. Now what
we know about Elijah is Elijah, when you read the story of Elijah,
we know that God's hand was on Elijah, and we also know that
Elijah was a leader. He was such a leader that the
Lord says that in the future in the book of Revelation, I'm
going to use Elijah to represent the prophets. That's how much
of a leader he was in his time there in the nation of Israel.
Now, look at 1 Kings 18, look at verse 17. It says, And it came to pass,
when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him, Art thou he that
troubleth Israel? So that's a strange thing to
ask Elijah. He comes to him and he says,
Are you the one that's troubling Israel? There's thousands of
prophets in Israel at this time. Thousands, and you see that over
in chapter 19, over 7,000 that still haven't bowed the knee
to Baal. And Ahab comes to him and says, you're the one troubling
Israel. Look how Elijah responds. And
he answers, I have not troubled Israel. He doesn't say we haven't
troubled Israel, but thou and thy father's house and that he
have forsaken the commandments of the Lord and the house of
Baal. You know what that means? That means that when it came
to the issue of serving the Lord and serving Baal, Elijah was
the authority on the side of serving the Lord. Meaning that
everybody thought Elijah was the one causing the controversy.
Elijah was the one that Ahab was looking for. Elijah was the
one that Jezebel wanted to kill. Elijah was the one that everybody
was thinking about. And you don't read any of the
names of the other thousands and thousands of prophets that
were there during that time. It's Elijah, he's a leader. You
can look at history and see cases like that. When you think of
the Reformation, you know who pops in your brain? Martin Luther.
Zwingli was during that time too. Nobody talks about, oh yeah,
you remember Zwingli. You remember during the Reformation
what Zwingli did, and you know what he was? He was way more
doctrinally sound than Martin Luther was. And as a matter of
fact, he was responsible for teaching better Bible to thousands
than Martin Luther did. But everybody thinks of Martin
Luther. Everybody thinks of William Tyndale. Nobody talks about Thomas
Bilney. Thomas Bilney was this little
guy, just a small guy with really frail bones, and he was a super
shy guy. And they used to call him Little
Bilney growing up because he hardly ever grew. And when he
was an adult, one time he goes out there to try to preach the
gospel when he figured out that the Catholic Church was lying
to him. And he found out that the Catholic Church was holding
back biblical texts because they didn't want the people to read
them and learn them. They wanted to keep it in Latin and not allow anybody
to understand what the scripture says, but take their word for
it. And he figured that out, and so he started studying that
stuff and he came to the right conclusions that salvation is
by grace through faith and that we do have the right to read
the Word of God. We should be able to give the Word of God
to the common person just like William Tyndale went off and
did and what he was known for. And he goes out there to street
preach one time to tell people this and he goes out there and
he says, I couldn't even do it. He was so nervous and so scared
he went back to his house. And he goes out there again,
he tries it again, he just, I can't get the words out, he goes back
to his house. So he says, okay, what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna
put the gathering in my house and I'm gonna have people come
over and I'm gonna teach them what I've been seeing. And this group
comes over and it was said that he sat there and shook. what
he taught. He just opened up his Bible in
his own house. He's sitting there shaking and
he's trying to explain to them that grace through faith and
that, listen, we can have the Word of God and the Word of God
is not bound and we're supposed to be able to put it out there
and let people know. And he was so scared that when he ended,
they said he took his Bible, he closed it, he turned around
and he just walked away. And they awkwardly sat there
and they looked and thought, okay, I guess it's over. But you know
who was sitting in that room? William Tyndale. And he said,
whoa, that's true. And he said, what I'm gonna do
is take what he says, and I'm gonna make every common man in
this country know about it. And he went off and did it. Thomas
Bilney didn't do that. Hardly anybody even knows who
that guy is. Unless you really read a lot of church history,
you don't read much about him. You say, why is that? Because he
wasn't a leader. Elijah was a leader. So Elijah
is the same way. He's back there in the prophets.
He's back there in the time of Israel when they're preaching
against Baal. And Elijah's the one getting
all this credit that naturally came to him. That's who he was.
It cannot be forced. He was a natural leader that
God put his hand on. And he said, that's Elijah's
strength. I'm gonna use it. You know, I read all kinds of
books on textual criticism. I have a great interest in that
study and being able to defend the King James Bible. I will
never, ever be like Dr. Ruckman was. I know that. I can never defend the Word of
God like Ruckman did. It's not who God made me to be.
That's not how God made me. I don't have the ability to have
people by the thousands say, oh, what does Tim Moore think?
And then we flock to what Tim Moore thinks. I don't have that.
You know who did? Dr. Ruttman did. And God used
that as a great leader. He uses men like Schofield and
Larkin, men that everybody says, well, they're kind of an authority
on scripture today. Let me go see what they have
to say. And he uses them. And I'm not even talking about
you have to be something drastic like that to where everybody
knows you. I'm just talking about the people
that are in your life, you have an effect on with who you are
as a person. And that can be a leader. I knew of a guy who
was a leader in church a long time ago, and he was able to
get people into the church. And in a short period of time,
he had all kinds of people who were not in church for years
coming back to church. And I'd hear people say, oh yeah, I'm
reading this book because so-and-so said it's a great book. Oh yeah,
I'm memorizing this chapter because so-and-so said it's a great chapter.
Oh, I'm doing this because so-and-so said this is great. And this
guy would go around and all these people would just follow him.
And I remember thinking, that is, why are so many people like
this guy? And I just didn't, I didn't understand
it. But one thing I could not deny
is that he had a natural charisma about him to where people just
wanted to please him more than they even wanted to please the
Lord. And he would say some of the dumbest stuff, and they would
take that hook, line, and sinker and say, well, so-and-so believes
it. And they would grasp, they would hang on to that as truth.
Because he was just a natural leader, he was able to do that.
You know what I found out later, too? He was able to lead a lot
of people out of church, too. And he did. A lot of people left
church one day because of him. You know where he led a lot of
people? To drugs and alcohol. People who were in PBI who were
in church. You have a great leadership, that's a great quality to have.
It's a great strength to be able to have. But boy, if you're not
careful with it, and you put that into your hands, you can
sure make a mess of your life. Look at chapter 19, what we're
hearing in 1 Kings. Chapter 19, look at verse 9.
And he came thither unto a cave, and lodged there. And, behold,
the word of the Lord came to him, and he said unto him, What
doest thou hear, Elijah? And he said, I have been very
jealous for the Lord God of hosts, for the children of Israel have
forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altar, and slain thy
prophets with a sword. And I, even I, only am left,
and they seek my life to take it away. And he says the same
thing in verse 14. And he said, I have been very
jealous for the Lord God of hosts, because the children of Israel
have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain
thy prophets with a sword. And I, even only I, am left,
and they seek my life to take it away. So Elijah's out there
and he's out there in a cave by that brook and he's thinking,
this is the worst thing ever because I'm the only one left
and nobody else is around. That wouldn't bother somebody
who's a loner. If you're a loner by nature as
a person, you would be out there and you'd be like, this is just
fine, not a problem. out here by myself, knowing that
I'm serving the Lord, knowing that I'm doing what I'm supposed
to be doing, preaching the gospel or preaching the message that
God gave Elijah. Because let me tell you, Elijah saying that
I'm alone, what does that have to do with the message that he's
been preaching? It doesn't change. And you know what a loner could
do? That's fine with me. You know how that affects somebody
who is a leader? They look around, they say, I
have nobody to lead right now. I don't have the back and forth
with people. I don't have that thing that just comes natural
to me to where I just want to take people and say, hey, let's
go this way. Hey, let's go this way. There's nobody around and
it's driving me crazy. I can't deal with this. But a
loner would have just sat there just fine and been happy out
there in that cave. Maybe even enjoyed it. But not
to somebody who's a leader and charismatic like that. You know
what you'll find? Your strengths that you have,
if they're not fully submitted to the Lord, they'll get you
in a mess like it does with Elijah to where he's ready to quit,
give up and die and say, I'm done. You know why? Because he
put stipulations on how God wanted to use them. He says, God, this
is how I am. I like to lead people and now
I have nobody. and they put stipulations on
it. You put stipulations on how you think God should use some
of your strengths, and you have some problems. You know, there
may be some good leaders in this church, and I have seen good
leaders in churches, and I have seen how they would make a better
deacon, a better song leader, a better pastor, better Sunday
school administrator, a better whatever, and in their brain
they think, I could lead these people better, I could do better,
I shouldn't be the one sitting and listening, and you know what
they do? They end up causing a big problem in a church because
of that. You say, what's the problem is?
It's not yielded to the Lord. Maybe God wants to put a leader
in a church for ten years to put some wisdom behind that ability
he gave him before he sends him out. You never know, but the
point is you have to put what God gives you into his hand and
let him use you as he sees fit. Look at Genesis chapter 25. And
when Elijah tried to take it into his hands and say, God,
this is not how I saw myself being used, it put him in a state
of depression. You present your bodies. That's
who you are in God's hand. You say, use me as you will. Look at Genesis chapter 25, and
this is one of my favorite ones. This is Jacob. And what we know
about Jacob is, first of all, let me just say this, when you
read about Jacob, don't look at him as a no good for nothing. Oh, that guy's just a conniver.
He's just a deceitful man. He's just this, he's just that.
He's a terrible character. Don't look at him as that because
you know what God said? God said, I love that man. I love Jacob. And he was just unfortunate enough
to have his sins printed in a book for us all to read. And it was
for our learning that God did that. If my sins were printed
in a book for you to read, you would not be here this morning.
And vice versa, if your sins are printed in a book, I'd say,
wait, those are the people I'm going to preach to? I'm going
to stay home. And you'd say the same thing about me. When God
printed what Jacob did in a book, you know what, Jacob for the
rest of his life now, or not the rest of his life, he's dead
and gone, but the rest of mankind, we get to look back and look
at Jacob's life and see all the problems that he made and all
the things that he did that was deceitful and wrong, but the
truth is, we have things about us that I am so glad are not
in a book. And just remember, God loved
Jacob. And what you see about Jacob's life is that oftentimes
he uses the strength that God gave him for good. And oftentimes
he uses the strength that God gave him for bad. And you know
what you'll find? Good things that come into Jacob's
life and you'll find bad things that come into Jacob's life because
of it. And what I want to say about Jacob is even though he
had problems, he also had a great strength. And what his great
strength was is he was a calculated son of a gun. That guy would
sit down and think every circumstance, every outcome, every scenario. If this happens, I can do this. If that happens, I'll do this,
this, this. And I have plan A, B, C, D, E,
F, and G for this scenario. And he just sits there and lets
his mind go, and it go, and it go. And you know what? Some of
you are that way. Maybe there's somebody in here
that's that way, that just thinks, OK, so if this happens, if they
respond this way, then I'm going to say this and do this. And
if this happens in the forethought, they put all this forethought
into it. That's not me. I'm kind of an idiot when it
comes to that. I am too lazy to want to sit
down and try to think out every scenario. And I just don't care
that much about it. You know what I find in my life?
Sometimes I'm glad I didn't try. Because it worked out better. Sometimes I find that I wish
I would have put some thought into that. and that's just not
a strength that I have, but there's been strengths of people who
have a mind where they just have a ton of forethought and they
look ahead and they think, okay, we can do all this stuff and
let me try to put all the pieces together, and great ministries
have been built off of that kind of mind. The problem is, the
tendency is, you have a tendency to forget about faith because
you can't figure it out and you can't make it work. And you say,
well, I can't deny this. Well, I know God said this, but
I need to force it and make it work. And that's what you see
in Jacob. Great calculator. Very, very good at looking at
a situation and saying, I can maneuver all these pieces and
put it right into place. But there has come points in
his life when he has to rely on God, and what he says is,
uh-uh, I'm gonna take that strength and that ability I have, and
I'm gonna finesse it and twist it into my way and make something
out of it. And you know what a strength
eventually becomes? It becomes a weakness when you do that.
Look at Genesis chapter, what did I say, 25? Look down at verse
29. Genesis 25-29, And Jacob sawed
pottage, and Esau came from the field, and he was faint. And
Esau said to Jacob, Feed me, I pray thee, with that same red
pottage, for I am faint. Therefore was his name called
Edom. And Jacob said, Sell me this day thy birthright. And
Esau said, Behold, I am at a point to die, and what profit shall
this birthright do to me? And Jacob said, Swear to me this
day. And he swore unto him, and he sold his birthright unto Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread, and
pottage, and lentils. And he did eat, and drink, and
rose up, and went his way. And thus Esau despised his birthright. Esau despised his birthright
in a way that even in the book of Hebrews the Lord looks at
that and says, Can you believe what that profane and wicked
man did? He sold his birthright for a bunch of lentils. And that's what a profane man
does. He comes in, he says, I'm at
the point to die. I'm just gonna get rid of something
that is valuable. Esau was not about to die. He's
walking and talking and carrying his stuff in from the fields.
That's not somebody who's about to die. You know what that is? That's somebody who is so quick
to sell something valuable in their life because they want
instant gratification. That was Esau. Esau's back in
his hometown. He's out of the woods now. He's
back where people are dwelling. He could have walked a little
bit longer, got to his mother's house and got some food. But
that's not what a profane person does. A profane person says,
I don't care about that. I don't care how valuable it
is. That's what people do all the time. I don't care about
how valuable the word of God is. I'm going to put it off for a
couple of weeks. Cause I got shows to watch and TV to watch
and I've got other things to do and they'll just sell three
weeks of their life. They could have been spending
in the word of God and growing for something that's just feels
good. After all, I need to relax. I've
had a hard week. After all, I need to relax because I'm very stressed
right now. Not to the point of death, you're
not. That's what we tell ourselves, though. And Jacob, on the other
hand, though, is even though Esau's coming in as a profane
person ready to give up his birthright, you take Jacob, and you know
what Jacob's doing? During that time when he sees
Esau walking out of the woods, Jacob takes a quick second, he
looks, and he thinks, He's been gone for a while. And
he's got no food with him. I bet he's really, really, really
hungry right now. And he says, I know exactly how
Esau gets when he's hungry. He's so undisciplined that what
he'll do is he'll sell his own birthright to me for food. Actually,
that's a good idea. I'm gonna try to see if he can
give me his birthright. And Esau comes in there, and
you know the story, he comes in there and he ends up selling
Jacob his birthright. And Jacob, you know what the Lord says,
let me ask you, could Jacob have gone about that a different way?
Yeah, he absolutely could have. Did he use that strength to calculate
that situation in the wrong way? Yes, he did. But you know what
the Lord still saw about Jacob? That Jacob wants the things that
last forever. Even though he went about the wrong way, he
said, there was at least a desire there for the things that matter.
So Jacob, even though he saw so quick to throw it off, Jacob
looks at that birthright and he says, I know what that thing
does. It comes with land. It comes with children. and it
comes with God's favor. And one day in the future, what
may happen is my land may be dry one day with the famine,
and I'm gonna need to put that thing before him and say, God,
here's the birthright, and he may just so send me some rain
on my land. And he's looking far into the future and calculating
away for the things that matter. Not the right approach. Look
at chapter 32. Not the right approach, but Jacob
at least cared for the things that mattered. And this story
that you read about Jacob there with him taking his birthright,
that was the beginning of a separation between two brothers that would
last for over 20 years. That was the beginning of a separation
that would just tear their family apart. That was the start of
it. Just that conniving toward his
own brother. Jacob was already told that the younger was going
to serve him. But he says, I don't forget faith, I'm gonna go about
it and try to make it work my way. And don't deceive yourselves,
you will reap what you sow. For over 20 years Esau lived
in the agony of what Jacob did to him. So much so that he was
still so angry with him in this chapter, chapter 32, where he's
ready to kill him. And then you know what happens
to Jacob? Do the math on it, for over 20 years he loses his
son Joseph. still as Esau is blessed and
God takes his blessed son from him for over 20 years. You're
going to pay for your sins. That reaping will come. And Jacob
experienced that because he took a great gift that God gave him
and he used it for himself. Look at chapter 32 here. And
the Lord had to deal with Jacob and put him in a place to where
he could get Jacob's attention. And you know chapter 32 here,
you still see toward the end of all this, after 20 years have
passed, Jacob still has not learned his lesson in being calculated.
still has not learned his lesson in trying to force things and
make things work to the point where he hears that his brother's
coming and right away he says, okay, Rachel and Leah, you're
going to separate and you're going to take these servants
and you're going to go this way and you're going to take these servants
and you're going to go that this way. And then what you're going
to do is my other servants, you're going to go out, you're going
to go out before me and you're going to go meet Esau. But when
you go, make sure there's a good distance between each of you.
You're going three different groups. The first group, you're
gonna go, and you're gonna present to Esau, and you're gonna say,
hey, here's a present for you. And he divides them up into three
different groups of presents, instead of presenting them all
at once. Have you ever been mad in somebody, you don't want to
be mad, and maybe it's with your spouse, and they say, they try
to squash the beef there, and you're just not quite ready,
but you're close. and they say something to you,
and you still say something sharp back, even though on the inside,
you're almost ready to be over it. You know what Jacob's doing? He's looking ahead, he's thinking,
that first present that gets to him, that might be the case. Esau comes and he says, get out
of the way, I'm still gonna kill him. But there's something inside
that will tug on his heart and say, I don't wanna do this. Maybe
when the second group comes. He'll say, get out of the way,
I'm still mad. He's like, maybe by the time
that third group comes, he'll be able to say, okay, you know
what, this is stupid. It was 20 years ago, let's forget
about it. That's how Jacob still is after 20 years. conniving,
calculating, and then he goes before the Lord and he says,
God, I'm so scared. Please remember the promises
that you gave me about preserving me and preserving my seed and
using me to bring the nation of Israel about. Please don't
forget those promises. I'm fearful, I'm afraid. I have
all these problems mounting up in my life. And he gets done
doing his prayer and he still rises up and he says, hey, you
take the kid and you cross over Jabuk. Because when Esau comes
and he's going to look at that river, he's going to say, no
way did they take all this cattle and kids across the river. They
probably went this way. But I'm going to be way over
here. That way if something happens to me, you guys can still escape.
He's still calculating. And what happens is the angel
of the Lord steps in. And if you know anything about
context in your Bible, pay attention to context. Verses that seem
random, they're not so random all the time. You read about
Moses fighting the will of God to go into Israel. And then right
there, there's a little blip of Zipporah coming in and circumcising
their son and throwing that foreskin at Moses' feet and saying, a
bloody husband art thou. That's not so random. It fits
the context of the two chapters before it and the chapter following
it. If you read them in a context, it makes perfect sense. Where
two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the
mist. Everybody says, there it is.
There's a promise that if two people get together and pray that you
have to be in the mist. That's not what it's talking about.
Read the context. You have seven or eight verses
on forgiving one another. And then you have, whatsoever
shall be bound on earth shall be bound in heaven. Whatsoever
shall be loosed on earth shall be loosed in heaven. You take care
of the animosity with your brother on earth. It doesn't have to
take place at the judgment. For where two or three are gathered
together in my name, there I am in the mist. Meaning, you squash
the beef with your brethren and the Holy Spirit is right there
in the center of that thing. And then you know what it does?
It carries on into more verses of context of forgiving one another.
Pay attention to context when you're reading it. You have Jacob
still calculating and calculating and trying to get out of this
and saying, I'm not gonna, I'm gonna fix this my own way. And
that angel steps in and says, hold on. Too long has that gone
on. For too long have you taken things
into your own hands. For too long have you tried to
fix things. For too long has this animosity between your brother
gone on. Stop. And I'm just gonna humble you
if I have to. And Jacob doesn't want to stop, so he starts fighting
and wrestling with that angel. Look at verse 24. And Jacob was left alone, and
there he wrestled a man with him until the breaking of day.
And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the
hollow of his thigh. And the hollow of Jacob's thigh
was out of joint, and he wrestled with him. And he said, Let me
go, for the day breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee
go. Except thou blessed me. And he said unto him, what is
thy name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, thy name shall no
more be called Jacob, but Israel. For as a prince, thou hast power
with God and with men, and hast prevailed. And Jacob asked him
and said, tell me, I pray thee thy name. And he said, wherefore
thou hast asked my name? And he blessed him there. So
Jacob does get a blessing in the midst of all this. That is
one calculating son of a gun. It is amazing when I read that
passage and see that Jacob is sitting there in the midst of
everything that's going on, and he's still asking for a blessing.
You know what your first impression of that is? What an entitled
man to actually think that he should be blessed right now.
But Jacob knows the Lord God, and Jacob knows that his God
is the type of God that likes to pick people up when they're
low. That's what he knows about him. And Jacob's laying there
and there and he's thinking, he's thinking, man, I destroyed
my family. I made a mess of it. Never saw my mom again after
she died. Never got to bury her. My brother, he's about trying
to come and kill me. I even ruined my relationship
with my wife's family to the point to where we have to have
a covenant of a rock so we promise not to go kill each other. So
that way, if that bitterness ever rises up, I'll go into his
land and I'll see those rocks and I'll say, you know what?
There was a covenant there before God that I can't go in there for
harm. That's how bad the strife was. And Jacob thinks, everywhere
I look, I just destroyed stuff. And now my leg's ruined for life. I've got nothing. I'm low, I'm
low, and I don't, I've never been this low before. And he
says, God, can you give me a blessing? And that's God's nature to do
that. You know, some of the times in my life when I've been so
low just in sin, in problems, has been the time that God has
picked me up. And you know what Jacob does? He knows that about
the Lord. And he says, I'm gonna get a blessing through this circumstance,
through this situation. I have seen Christians that have
such a great strength with that. A problem that arises in their
life. And you know what they say? This is terrible, how can
I get a soul through it? This is terrible, how can I help
somebody through it? That's a great strength to have.
But you know what, that calculating mind to actually look at things
like Jacob was able to look at and get things out of him was
the same calculating mind that one day walked into Isaac's tent
and said, your son Esau, and put forth his hands and let him
rub his arms and stole Esau's blessing. That same strength
that Jacob had about him brought him low and messed his whole
family up. But it's the same strength that
he got the spiritual blessings from the Lord. Christian, the
things that you have about you as a person, you put that in
God's hand and he can use that. But you take it into your own
hands and you will make a mess of your life and make a mess
of things. Let's look at one more. We won't
be long on this one. We're almost we're almost out
of time. Look at John chapter six. This one is, of course,
Peter. He's one of my favorite in the
Bible. I think he's a lot of people's
favorite in the Bible just because he's got such a bold and strong
personality. And of course, In dealing with
Peter and his personality and the way he is, you have to talk
about the big mouth that he has. That's something that anybody
who's ever read through their Bible or been in church for any
amount of time knows that Peter had a big mouth. That's just
who he was as a person. And oftentimes he put his foot
in his mouth and oftentimes it was used for good. And Peter
here in John chapter 6, look at verse 66 is the first time
chapter 6 verse 66 shows up and it has to do with his disciples
drawing away from him. From that time many of his disciples
went back and walked no more with him. Then said Jesus unto
the twelve, Will ye also go away? So who is Jesus talking to? The
twelve. Then look at verse 68. Then Simon Peter answered him.
So he's talking to the twelve, but Simon Peter's the one who's
going to answer. Lord, and then he answers for them and tells
them what they think. Lord, to whom not shall I go,
but Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal
life. And those guys just sit there and they let Peter talk
for them and tell them exactly what you're thinking. You know,
I've known some big mouth people that would do that to me. No,
Timmy and I don't want that. Yes, I do. I didn't say that. You just answered for me or told
people what I want. That's what Peter does. And you
know, it doesn't go into it, do it in the chapter here, but
it doesn't expound on how close that some of those disciples
must have come to some of those other ones that finally walked
away. There were some friendships there. There were some memories
of laughter and some memories of some good times and serving
the Lord together. And then they just walk away.
And it hurts when a Christian friend walks away. I have a couple
that did that, where they just walk away and they're no longer
in church, no longer serving the Lord. That hurts. And maybe
they're thinking about that, I don't know. All I know is Peter
says, Lord, we're not gonna go anywhere. We're all gonna stay
here. Because to whom shall we go?
That's how Peter was. Look at Mark chapter 9. We're not going to read all the
accounts of his big mouth, but just a couple, just these two
here. Mark 9, verse 2, it says, And there appeared unto them
Elias and Moses, and they were talking with Jesus. Peter answered
and said to Jesus, Master, it is good for us to be here. Let
us make us three tabernacles, one for thee, one for Moses,
and one for Elias, for he wist not what to say. So Peter's the
type of personality that when it gets quiet, it gets awkward,
nobody's talking, he's going to blurt out something. He's
the type of personality when you're in a delicate situation,
his mouth is going to shoot off because he just doesn't know
what to say. I have friends like that. that just, boop, there
it goes. And you know what you tell them?
Hey, if you don't know what to say, don't say anything. You
don't always have to be talking. Always have to be telling somebody
your thoughts. But that's how, that's a big mouth's natural
tendency is to be talking and talking loudly and letting everybody
know what you think. That's a big mouth, but you know
what? In God's hand, he can use that big mouth. In your own hand,
you're gonna drive wedges between relationships and say things
that hurt people. And maybe some Christian just
might be down and you'll go over there and you'll kick them even
harder when that's not what they need. You put that personality
of yours in your own hands, you make a mess of it. And that's
what Peter does. You know, when I was down there
in school, I had two friends down there and they were both
big mouths and all they ever did was talk, talk, talk, and
they were really loud. and sometimes annoying, but they
were still my friends. I remember this one guy in class,
and down there, these guys, they worked framing out there in the
sun, and so they were outside all day working, and they'd go
to class at night, and this guy had a family too on the side.
He had a lot on his plate, so he was always tired in class,
so sometimes he would doze off in class. Real hard worker. up
at six, working straight to school in his work clothes, sitting
in class. That's hard, out in that sun. And he's sitting there
in class one day, and I'm sitting right where he's sitting, and
he's sitting right where he's sitting, on the front row there,
right across from each other. And he starts dozing off and
pushes his hands like this. And he's just going. That's too
loud. He's going. And he starts going. He's starting to snore. And Dr.
Ruttman is just still teaching. And he's just. His head's going
down and he's over here like this. Snoring. And then Dr. Rubbin says something
that's really funny and the whole class goes, blah, blah, blah,
blah. They're just laughing. And this guy goes, yeah, amen, amen. And I was thinking like, you
don't even know what he said. You were sleeping. Why are you
doing that? He wisps not what Dr. Ruttman said, but he felt like
other people are being loud, so I have to be loud. That was
this guy's personality. Just be loud, be heard. You know
what I've watched that guy do, though? Stand in front of a concert
with over 1,000 people out there and preach without showing an
ounce of fear when he's being threatened to be beat up if he
doesn't stop. That big mouth, just out there preaching the
Word of God for 30 minutes, as these angry people are around
him, just screaming at him, shut up! I'm gonna hurt you! And one
guy pulls out a knife, I'll stab you! And he just preaches the
Bible, preaches the Bible. That's a big mouth in God's hands.
I had another friend down there who was just as bad as this guy.
He was a real good friend of mine and he was always putting
his foot in his mouth. Always. In the three years I
was down there, he came to me multiple occasions crying because
I said this about so-and-so and then I told him what I told his
wife what he told me in confidence and then now they're fighting
and they're mad at me and and then I told my old pastor something
that brother Donovan told me in confidence and now they're
mad at me and now he's just always crying because he's putting his
mouth foot in his mouth is always talking always talking and you
always knew when this guy was there I'd be sitting in class
and all the way outside out here With that just long laugh that's
just so obnoxious and you could just hear it through the building.
And you're just like, oh, someone's over here. And then you can walk
in that, he had a strut, you can walk in that building. Like
this. Timmy! Across the way, and you're
just like, oh my gosh. Like this guy is too much. And
that's how he was, just a big mouth. I mean, just loud. We're
in class one time, Dr. Ruttman's teaching. He says,
so you see those words that are in italics? Those were not found
in the original. They're not part of original
inspiration. And what they are is they're giving. Dr. Ruttman!
He didn't hear me. Dr. Ruttman! And he's like, yeah? He's like, did you just say that
the part of the Bible's not inspired? No. I said, all scripture is
given by inspiration of God. That means those italics that
were added, any time you're adding from one language to another
language, you have to put words in to make sense. But those words
were not in the originals, but they're still given by inspiration.
And he just turns around to the class, he just goes, whew, I
thought Dr. Upton was going to apostate.
And everybody's just, just sit down. Just stop. Just have a
seat. That was this guy. He's preaching
in class, and I knew him well enough at this point that he's
telling a story that's not true. And he gets down, I meet another
guy who knew him. We're having glances in class as he's preaching. We get down, we say, hey, did
you make that story up? Yeah. I make up stories all the
time when I preach. Like, you can't do that. Why?
It works. That's what he said. Why, it
works. He said, I make up stories all the time. That's called lying. He's like, do people laugh at
him? Okay then. And that was this
guy's mentality. Just a big mouth that just shoots
his mouth off constantly. And over the years, I watched
that guy put his foot in his mouth and make a mess of stuff. And he even hurt some friendships.
Some people he was friends with for a long time, they broke their
confidence bad. and destroyed some stuff. But
I'll tell you this, that's the same guy that the Lord put his
hand on that big mouth and used it. One day he's walking through
a hospital and he's just strutting along. And he stops and he looks. And in this room, there's this
old lady that's laying on this bed. And all these family members
are standing around her. The normal person would want
to give them their space. the normal person would wanna
be courteous about it. This guy walks up with those
big, heavy doctor doors that weigh 100 pounds that are loud,
and he goes. And all those heads go. And he
says, is she dying? And they said, yeah, she doesn't have much longer.
He said, can I ask you guys a question? He just bites himself in the
room. Does she know Jesus as her savior? And I said, you know,
actually she does. We grew up in such and such Baptist
church, and we're all saved, and we know Christ as our savior,
and she's going home to heaven when she dies. He says, can I
talk to her for a second? And they awkwardly look at each
other, and they think. Sure, go ahead. And he walks
in that room, and he takes that old, those doctor chairs, and
he goes, and scoots it across the way, makes all that noise,
just who he was, just loud. And he plops down, and he gets
down that lady's ear, and he says, hey, ma'am, you don't know
me. You don't know who I am. And
he starts crying, too. And he says, I just came walking in.
And I saw you laying on this bed, and your family tells me
you're saved. I just wanna tell you something.
I just wanna remind you that the Lord is my shepherd, I shall
not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. He leadeth
me beside the still waters. And he says, he gets down that
part about the valley of the shadow of death, and he says,
you're gonna cross that valley now. But remember, the still
waters are on the other side. And Jesus Christ will go through
you, go through those waters with you. And that old lady starts
crying. She's near her death and those
tears start coming down her face. And he gets up and he struts
out. And all those family members
are just in tears at the end of that thing. That's a big mouth
in God's hand. He can take a big mouth and your
personality and who you are, you put it in God's hand and
he'll use you to be a blessing to some Christians. You know,
Peter found himself in a mess. After he made it public that
Jesus Christ was not going to die, put his foot in his mouth
and said, he ain't gonna die. I'm not gonna let that happen.
And then, you know what he does? He finds himself sitting by a
fire, just sitting there with his head down and just depressed
and worried about how he just blew it again because of just
his natural tendency. Why does he do this? Why do I
say the things I say? Why do I do this? And you know
what happens though? The Lord gives us second chances.
And one day Peter's out there at Pentecost in Acts chapter
two. And Peter's standing out there
and he's looking out across this way and he sees thousands of
men. Thousands out there. And the
Lord comes down and he says, Peter, I want you to preach. And he says, to everybody? He says, yeah, to everybody.
And Peter says, this is exactly what I was born for. And he takes
that Bible and he goes out there and he says, Men and brethren,
these are not drunk, as ye suppose, seeing it is but the third hour
of the day. But this is the prophecy of Joel, where men shall dream
dreams, and women shall have visions. Even the handmaids and
the servants shall see dreams and have visions, and the sun
shall be darkened." He goes through this whole message, and over
3,000 people come to be joined to the church that day. You know
what God does with our personalities? We'll constantly find ourselves
making a mess of things in our life because of who we are. but
you present your body as a living sacrifice. That's everything
about you, that's your personality, that's your characteristics,
that's who you are. You say, God, I am yours. And
he'll take that and he'll use it. Let's stand for prayer. I guess we'll have the piano
play and just pray for a few minutes. Now, every one of you has something
about you as a person that you're gonna stand before
the judgment seat of Christ for. It's like I said earlier, I'm
not Dr. Ruppman. I'm not Clarence Larkin. but I'm me. And I can hand a
tract to somebody over the urinal and give it to that person to
tell them about Jesus Christ. That's something I have about
me that I'm okay in those weird, awkward situations. They don't
bother me too bad. Now, what do you have? Because God will use it. I beseech you, brethren, that
you present your bodies, your bodies as a living sacrifice. You know, I remember one time
this guy on a job site, he had a terrible childhood. His mom,
just as stubborn as can be, this guy was. But God can use stubbornness. And he's on this job site, I'm
talking to him, and he's telling me this story about how his stepdad
used to beat him growing up. Punch him in the face, smack
him around, and his mom never did anything about it. She never
stood up for him, she never protected him. That was 30 years ago, this
guy was in his 40s now. And I'm talking to him, and he
says, I will never forgive her. And I said, you've been hanging
on to that thing for a long, long time now. He says, I'll
hang on to it till the day I die. Stubborn, just as stubborn as
can be. I will never let that go is what
he told me. And 25, 30 years of his Christian
life is gone and wasted. But you submit that stubbornness
to the Lord. I know of a missionary up in the villages of Alaska
where hardly anybody even knows who he is. Those villages are
so small up there with a group of 200 people that lives in that
village. Snows in July there. Just cold
all year round. Just up there serving the Lord
and his son saying, Dad, if you don't take me out of this place,
I'm gonna kill myself. Dad, if you don't take me out
of this place, I'm gonna kill myself. You know, he says to his son,
you do what you gotta do, but this is where I'm called. And
that kid puts a shotgun in his mouth one day, pulls that trigger
and blows his head off. That guy got a call from all
kinds of pastors that he knew that said, this is a sign from
God to step off the field. He said, I'm going forward. I
will not leave where God put me. He said, my son couldn't
handle it, that's his problem. But this is where I'm supposed
to be. His granddaughter at four years old, dying of cancer. They said, leave the field, go
be with your family back in Fairbanks. He said, I'm going forward. This
is where I'm supposed to be. Stubborn. And look at the two
extreme outcomes. You know what God will take?
Your characteristics about you. And man, can he use them for
something. or use them for yourself and
you'll just make a mess of your whole life. Thank you. Brother Isaac, could
you close us in prayer, please?
Giving your Personality to the Lord
Series Sermons
| Sermon ID | 10624202967148 |
| Duration | 1:05:43 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday - AM |
| Bible Text | Romans 12:1 |
| Language | English |
Documents
Add a Comment
Comments
No Comments
© Copyright
2026 SermonAudio.