Well, to God be the glory. Amen. Look, Brother Mike, when you crack like that, Brother Jesus oozes out. Amen. Aren't y'all glad for that? Amen and amen. That's right. We just look, when you feel with Jesus and somebody touches you, Jesus comes out. Amen. We definitely appreciate that. We thank y'all for having us. It's been six years since we've been with y'all and we've had several different times through the last six years. that your pastor has reached out to try to get us back with y'all. And for whatever reason, things fell through because of a pandemic and just circumstances and things like that, that we wasn't able to actually connect and be here. So we're just grateful for the providence of God that he's allowed us to come. Thank y'all for being a blessing to my bride last night and warmly welcoming her. We appreciate your pastor and his sweet bride, Miss Bertie, that has been so kind and gracious to welcome us. Y'all extended great hospitality to us. And we value that and appreciate that. You know, every one of the believers of God have been graced by God to be hospitable. Not everybody has the gift of hospitality, but because of the grace of God, we can be hospitable wherever we are, whether it be in God's house or in our home or out on the streets. Because of grace, we're able to extend the love of Jesus to those far and near, amen. When you were singing that, I couldn't help but think about that unsafe boy that left his parents' home and wanted his inheritance early. Y'all probably have heard of his name being the prodigal son. The word prodigal means unsafe. That living had no characteristics of God upon it. It was just unsafe, prodigal living. And he got far away from his father. Why? Because he really in his mind thought that he knew better, that he knew better than daddy. that he knew better than his family, and he wanted better for himself because he thought he knew better, but he find himself what? In the hog's pen, didn't he? And he would have gladly eaten what the hogs were eating, but he couldn't even do that. Why? Because he found that in this world, in his despair, that no matter how far away he was, that his father was much better than he gave him credit to be. Matter of fact, that's the conclusion he came to. It says, when he came to himself, He realized how much better his daddy was than everybody else. So what did he do? He tracked out and went home, amen? So no matter how far you go in life and get away, it's all because you thought you knew better. But you'll come to the conclusion, Lord willing, before it's everlasting too late, that God always knows better. And you can put your full confidence in Him and you don't have to live unsafely with Him. Matter of fact, He'll salvage your life and make you safe with Him. and then make you safe to go to work for him, amen. That's what the salvaging, saving work of the Lord Jesus would do. So I would invite you this morning to turn to 1 Corinthians chapter number one. 1 Corinthians chapter number one. I'm reading through Corinthians right now. I'm in chapter number two would be in the second. But I wanted to draw something out of this passage in 1 Corinthians 1 in verse number 10 that I believe will help you in the days ahead. And I think it's an encouragement to me. We may look at a few other passages as well to undergird it, to support it. But 1 Corinthians 1 in verse number 10, I'm gonna read and then I'll have a word of prayer. and we ask God to help us today with this word. So he says, now I plead with you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing. and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment. The same, the same, the same. The same voice, the same vision, and the same verdict. Father, we come before you. and humble ourself in your sight and bend our knee and our heart in your presence. And we ask you, Lord, to speak to us. Lord, we need to hear from you today. For if you don't speak, we'll walk out of this place empty handed and empty hearted other than what we brought into this place today. So we're at your mercy. And therefore, we asking you to show us some things that would be beneficial for us, not just today, but Lord willing, you give us tomorrow and the next in the days ahead, you will help us as we walk together with you. So we're grateful today for the secret place. for the hiding place, for that nest up in the high mountains that is away from the enemy and that strong tower. We're thankful for the heritage or the legacy that you grant to those that fear you. And now we ask in you, Lord, to speak life into your people. In Jesus' name, amen. The same, the same, the same. Y'all notice that in that passage there, you may have it on the board up here, but he says that you speak the same thing and be of the same mind and of the same judgment. that as the family of God, you see folks in here today, some of y'all are family by blood, and some of you are family through the blood, but if you're family, you're what? Family, amen? And I am grateful to be part of the family of God, and to be part of the family of God, we all need one voice. One vision, one mindset, one thing we're aiming at, and then one verdict on which we stand on, the ground by which we stand on. Brother Mike was telling me before we were admiring y'all's facilities and y'all's flooring and what y'all have done in here, The last time we were here, y'all had not done this at this point, but we keep up with y'all and see what's going on. And I've actually asked your pastor to send me pictures because we are in the process at our fellowship at Briggs Chapel of doing something very similar. And we really value what y'all put together. He said, but y'all had to redo this whole floor when y'all did that. He said, you used to be able to bounce in here when you walked through it. Was that so? The flooring was that bad. You had to pull it all up and redo it. So you had to take the groundwork and rework it so that you had good solid footing when you put this flooring down. Well, that's the idea of the same verdict in life. You gotta have the same ground that you're standing on. A judgment is a verdict. It's a confession of what God has already declared to be, and you as a congregation wanna stand on the verdicts of God. What he said, as Jesus would say, man's not to live on bread alone, but what, every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord. What does that really mean? Every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord. It means what God says about a thing is more important than the thing itself. what God says about food, what God says about your marriage, what God says about life, what God says about eternity, about salvation. That goes down to every little thing in life. If God said it, we can trust it, believe it, lean on it, live by it, and make it our aim in everyday life. And if you're not on the right foundation, on the right verdicts, the judgments of God, if you as a congregation aren't standing on that, you won't be of the same mind. and you won't speak the same voice. You'll be a family that is divided, doing your own thing in your own way, and that doesn't take individuality from any of us. Matter of fact, we're all accountable before the Lord individually, but we're also accountable to one another as a family that we have one voice together. We stand and speak the same things. As your sign says out there, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Jesus. Amen. Everything needs to be about Jesus. When we speak, we speak as the oracles of God. We speak and let our words be filled with grace and truth and seasoned with salt. That is, we speak what we hear in from the Lord, and then what God is doing in our life to transform our lives, to change us, how our testimony lines up with the truth. We bring the truth to this community. We bring the truth to this state and this country, and we tell them this is the truth of the Word of God. This is the grace of God at work. And let me tell you how this grace, how this truth, how this changed my life I've conformed myself by faith to what God is teaching me here. That is the idea of you as a fellowship. See the church at Corinth was having all kind of issues and conflicts because people were just acting like normal people. and you can't live like a normal person in the Kingdom of God and function in the things that God wants you to function in. You are an extraordinary new creature in Christ Jesus who's been given newness of life, who's been given the ministry of reconciliation, who's been given the message of the gospel to see lives radically transformed, no matter where they come from, no matter what background they have, no matter what they've seen, experienced, and walked through, Jesus is able to penetrate their lives and change them from within, amen? I have to know that I have the single best message that's ever been given to anybody in the entire world, the message of Jesus. Matter of fact, the Bible's pretty high on that message, amen? God says he's only got what? One way. One way. truth, and one life that He offers unto humanity, and it's the Lord Jesus Christ. God has one answer, and His answer has to be my answer, amen? It has to be the answer I stand on, and the reason I stand on it, because God continues to validate to me again and again. How many of y'all have to do Use your computers. Anybody use computers? How many of you have to sign in to areas that you're working, whether it's banking? How many of y'all bank with your computer? Anybody do electronic banking? Digital banking? How many of y'all on Facebook raise your hand? How about Instagram? You know you like to be signed into those things so you don't have to keep signing yourself in. How many of y'all have trouble remembering your passwords? I mean, you've got so many passwords, you run through a gamut of them when they say, what's your password? And you run through it again and again, you say, I still ain't got it right. Because every day they were increasing those numbers and those characters and you get lost in the midst of it. But you know why they have those passwords and why they do that? There has to be an authentication key. that when that authentication key is signed in, that says everything behind that is legit, it's trustworthy. That's why when you deal with your bank, they wanna either face recognition or a certain way that they know who they're working with because they don't want anybody having access to your resources and you don't want anybody, you ain't got enough to begin with. You don't want nobody to have what you got, right? I know we're all in that boat. But an authentication key identifies that you are who you are and everything that comes behind you is safe with that. Well, we have an authentication to the truth and it's the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the justification, the validation that we need, that all we need to say that everything Jesus said, everything Jesus did, everything that we'll ever do, his resurrection validates you got the trustworthiness of the Lord behind you and you can put your life in his hands and you can trust everything he said, every person he touched, every miracle that he performed, every word that he taught, you can bank your life on it because you got the key. He came out of the grave, amen? And he's true to his word. He's always true. So we gotta have one voice. The things we communicate, one, we communicate the same things in life as a congregation, as a group of people. We are committed to the same things as a congregation and that we confess the same things that God is granting you a vision how to reach Crockett County. How to reach this city and beyond where you are. I know you want God working in you, and all God's people say it. Don't you want Him working with you? Aren't you glad He's worked for you? Don't you want Him to work through you? But don't you want Him to work beyond you? Amen. Beyond what you can potentially do or ever do. that He can take what you do today and even years after you're gone, the life that was in the work that you did will still touch people's lives down the road. Y'all remember that Older Testament prophet by the name of Elisha? There's a sweet picture in the book of 2 Kings chapter number 13 that deals with a group of people that went to bury a man one day and some bandits were coming, so they took the man that they was gonna bury and just threw him in the grave. And when that dead body hit the bones of Elisha, the scripture says that man bounced out of that grave and came back to life by simply touching the bones of a man who had been anointed by God. You want your life. You want your words. You want your works, the things you share on Facebook and the things you share on Instagram, the things you talk about in this community, the things you share in this congregation, the things you share around your table at home, the things that get pinned about what you did and how you did it and why you did it. Say 100 years from now, say the Lord doesn't come, Before then, 100 years from this date, somebody read that, hear that, see that, and they're dead in their trespasses and sins, but when they hear it, God grants them life on the things you left behind simply because what you left was touched by God. Don't you want your life to live beyond this day, amen? To live beyond. Well, how then can you, how can we as the people of God stand with one voice, one vision and one verdict? I don't have all day, and I know you don't either, and I've only got one shot with you today to tell you a few things that I think can help y'all as a congregation get to this place. And this is where I would encourage you, when we look at this and see the pattern or the process that we find in this one particular passage, if you will apply this in your daily life, every day, I think it will radically make such a difference in your walk Not just individually, but corporately as a body, y'all will all walk with one voice, one vision, and one verdict on life. So go to Ezekiel, an Older Testament book of Ezekiel, Ezekiel chapter 40, Ezekiel chapter 40 and verse number four. Now, if you're like me, it wasn't too many years ago, I didn't know where the books of the Bible were. Anybody ever else find themselves there? You may be in here today and you have no clue where Ezekiel's at. I'm gonna give you a few minutes to get there. I know they're gonna put it up on the screen as well, because he asked me if I had anything to give away for y'all to see. But if you'll go to the book of Psalms, Proverbs, Isaiah, Jeremiah, you'll come to the book of Ezekiel. And go toward the end of the book, around chapter number 40. I'll give you a minute to find it. And when you get there, I want you to look around verse number four, if you would. But as the point I made, it wasn't too many years ago when I would go to church, I had no clue what the Bible taught. I didn't know any books of the Bible. If somebody said, go to this book, I thought the Bible was one book, and it is, but I didn't know it had 66 books in the one book. I would have to go find the table of contents, and by the time I normally got to the passage, the preacher was already finished. So, as a preacher myself, I understand where you are, and I'll let you get to where you wanna go, because I believe it's so valuable. But this book of mine is a treasure chest. It's got all the treasures I need to live life. People ask often when I go places, man, I hope you deliver a good sermon today. Well, I don't deliver good sermons. I'm not a deliverer of sermons, I'm a discoverer of light and truth. And what I try to do is give you a little bit of things that I've discovered and prayerfully those discoveries would lead you to life. Stephanie was reading something to me this morning about a discovery that kind of laid dormant for years and years and years, but everybody in here today used what they discovered way back in the 40s was used today in your own life, and you probably don't even know you used it. You don't even know who discovered it. But it's a tool that you use often in your own life. I think the lady's name, what was her name, Stephanie? Hattie? Lamar anybody have ever heard that name some of you older folks know who she is she was an actor right Hedy Lamar Well back in the 40s she After she came to America changed her name she was a Married while she lived in Austria area, she was married to a military man that had a brilliant mind with ammunition and a tradesman, a guns tradesman in those days doing the war. Well, she paid attention to what they talked about and what they did and what they didn't do. And when she eventually left and came to America, she got together with somebody and they created this ability because the Americans were having a very difficult time using their technology to bypass the Germans and these other armies, they couldn't get past them with the technology. They're picking up all their sonar, their radar, and all this. Well, she developed, along with another man, developed some technology that allowed them to send radio transmissions so fast that bounced all over. You couldn't detect it. This was in the 40s. She went to the US military. They tried to sell it to the military and they mocked her and laughed at her and sent them back home, but they built a patent on it. Well, it wasn't too many years ago. Somebody looking through those patents came and saw the technology that they developed back then. And you know what it is called today? Like Bluetooth technology, Wi-Fi technology. That is where all that came from and developed that. How many of y'all are grateful for Wi-Fi? What about Bluetooth? We use it every day. Do you use it in your car? Use it on your phones? Well, you see, somebody discovered that back in the 40s, developed it, tried to sell it, but it wasn't time and they wouldn't buy onto it. But over time, that discovery turned into a breakthrough. that has helped people throughout time now. For an example, how many of y'all have ever had to use penicillin before? How many of you allergic to penicillin? How many have ever used another antibiotic? We see in 1928, Alexander Fleming was looking through a microscope at some bacteria and he realized that This bacteria was kept back by this form of mold on that little Petri dish. So what they did was start working with that bacteria and that mold, and they realized that this mold could keep back and stop the progression or the growth of bacteria. So they purified it, multiplied it, and we use it today as penicillin. But that discovery became a major breakthrough for people all over the world. You know, a lot of people died before they had penicillin or antibiotics. Some of you may have died in times past because you had some kind of an infection in your body and the only thing that kept that infection back was some form of antibiotic that you took. How many of you ever had to have surgery and had to be on antibiotics? How many of you ever had teeth pulled and they put you on antibiotics? Everybody in here has been affected by it. See, that one discovery became a breakthrough for millions of people across the planet and is still affecting people's lives. And as we, as Bible-believing believers, all the answers to life and godliness are found in Christ Jesus and in his message. They're all there. That mold had always been there, but it took somebody, Brother Mike, to discover it. and that one discovery opened up a breakthrough that changed other people's lives. And we as Bible people are discovering light and life that's always been in the revelation of God, but when we discover it and it does something in our life and then we go share it with other people, that one discovery of you digging in the Word and finding a truth that God is changing you to walk in, can be such a breakthrough for other people when you share it in your everyday life. You think about the gospel, the light that God shined upon you when you found yourself in sin and you recognized that everything you've been taught and everything you've been led to had you bound and wrapped up in sinfulness and you had no hope in and of yourselves. but the gospel light of the Lord Jesus said, in spite of you and in spite of what you've done, while you were ungodly and a sinner, the Lord Jesus laid his life down to reconcile you unto a holy God and make you safe with him and then change you and give you newness of life that you can walk with. Man, that's a discovery that leads to a breakthrough that'll change a community, amen. It's light and life. from the Lord. Well, Ezekiel chapter 40 in verse number four, I believe we see something in there. I see something in this that is a great discovery for me and I wanna unveil it to you and I pray it will be a breakthrough in your everyday life as you walk with the Lord. And I think this is how I approach the truth and I believe and I would hope you would see something very similar. God was gonna show Ezekiel something that he would never see outside of God unveiling it to him. You see, revelation is God showing you something that you couldn't otherwise see unless God shows it. And we need God giving us light and unveiling truth. But notice what he said, how he said this. Verse number four says, and the man said to me, son of man, that was a unique term set aside for Ezekiel, as well as Jesus, son of man, notice the first thing, look. Look with what? Look with your eyes and do what? Hear with the ears and what? Fix your heart or your mind on everything what? I show you for you were brought here so that I might show them to you so that you can declare to the house of Israel what? Everything you see. You see, seeing in God's world is how we get to see the vision that God gives to us. But in the kingdom of God, you gotta hear to see. Faith cometh by what? hearing and hearing by the word of God. Notice the availability that Ezekiel had to give to what was gonna be shown to him. He was gonna unveil this revelation to him, this light to him, but notice what he made available. He had to make his eyes available, his ears available, and his heart available. You could might as well say he made his life available to the Lord. He gave himself. So each and every day of your life, when you open up the Word of God, how many of you spend time in devotion in the morning? Raise your hand. If you're not, now everybody's morning's a little different than everybody else. Some of you might be working a night shift, so your morning is different than my morning. But I would encourage you, you are not gonna be what God intended you to be if you're not seeking the Lord first every day. Hands down. It doesn't matter how, what quality of a person you are or the things you could do or the skill sets you might have. If you want it to last, if you want it to be of God, you have to make yourself available to the Lord. You got to give God your attention. You gotta give your heart available to him each and every day. That's one of the reasons why churches are not of the same mind, of the same voice, and of the same verdict, because very few in that congregation are meeting with Jesus every morning. God wants to show you things, and all God's people said, but He's not gonna give you things that you are not giving yourself to Him for to speak into your life. I could take you in various other places throughout the scripture and show you what I'm talking about of how important it is to make your life available. And when you do, when you open up the Word, you wanna give your attention, your eyes to it, your ears to it. You wanna apply your heart to what God is gonna show you. Why does he wanna show you something? So that you can discover what he sees. And when you discover what he sees, that discovery is gonna be a breakthrough in your life. It's gonna be better than penicillin, amen? It's gonna be better than Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. It's gonna be better than any discoveries that you could ever find when God is willing to speak life and light into your life. You have to be in position to see and hear what God wants to show you and apply your heart to it. Matter of fact, turn to the book of Proverbs. Let me show you this. Proverbs, hold your spot in Ezekiel. I wanna see this. I got one shot with you, so I'm gonna try to give you something that will help you beyond today. Y'all good with this? Beyond today. Beyond today. How many of y'all feel like you don't learn well? Raise your hand. I got some smart folks in here, amen. Woo! You got a group, brother. Praise the Lord. Well, I wasn't like that. I wasn't like that. Go to Proverbs 16, 3. Let me show you this. Proverbs 16, let me give you some, let me give you some hope. I was what I would consider a big dummy. I didn't think I could learn. I didn't think I had the capacity to really learn well. I didn't do very well in school. And I know in the years that we've worked with y'all, I've probably shared that with you in the past. And if I haven't, I apologize because it's a very important part of my testimony of what God has done in my life. I did not do well in school. The only reason I went to school because I had a pretty girl that was at school and I like playing ball. and school offered me ball and a pretty girl, so I went to school. I didn't care about anything else. I don't recommend that to anybody in here. Go to school to have good relationships with people and learn something and learn it the right way. Well, that wasn't me, and I didn't have that capacity or even that mindset when I went to school, so I hardly even applied myself. I applied playing ball and I applied chasing girls, but it wasn't schoolwork that I applied myself to. Not only did it hurt me then, but it hurt me from there on out that it put me in positions that I would not like to be in because I just didn't prepare myself well enough to be in another position. So, when the Lord interrupted my life and began to show me things in His Word, this proverb is probably the single most transformational truths that God spoke in my life in my early days, and it's been something that I applied my heart to ever since. But He says, In 16.3, commit your works. That would say, roll, give over all that you are. Make your life available to the Lord. And what does God promise that he will do for you? The Lord will establish what? And if you're gonna walk with the Lord, he's gotta be renewing your mind. He's gotta be transforming. Proverbs 16, three is Romans 12, one and two in the Old Testament. What does 12, one and two in the New Testament of Romans say? I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God. That you what? Make yourself available. Present yourself to the Lord as a living sacrifice. holy and acceptable unto him, which is our responsibility. That's our part. We give ourselves to him as a living sacrifice. And the scripture says, don't be conformed, don't let this world squeeze you and mold you into its ways, but what? Be transformed by the renewing of your mind and then you can prove what is that what? Good and acceptable and perfect will. You and I will not be able to prove what God's will is in this world we live. We can't have one voice, one vision and one verdict if he's not renewing my mind daily. And when I say daily, that's in the morning, but that's throughout the day. Proverbs 3, 5, and 6 says, trust the Lord with, with what? Make it available. Availability. You've given your availability to the Lord. You've given your attention to the Lord. Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean not upon, but in all your ways, what? Okay, so God taught me something yesterday, and I have what he's taught me yesterday in my capacity and my understanding, but today he's teaching me not to lean on my understanding, but to lean in on him so that I can, what? Live and walk by faith. I can live and walk by faith now. Not rely on yesterday. Not rely on last night. That is far spent and far gone. The only time I had to bless God is right now, amen. And the only way to bless him is by faith. And faith only comes from hearing from him. So it's impossible for me to accidentally obey him. I have to be freshly hearing from him, leaning on him, trusting him, and walking with him in what he's giving me right now, amen. So when I recognize that If I would just make my heart, my life, and what I'm doing in life available to the Lord, God would intervene in my life and establish my thinking. And if anybody in the world needed somebody thinking rightly for him, it was me, because I didn't think rightly. I didn't act rightly. I didn't speak rightly. I didn't do things rightly. So when I read that, and by faith, those truths jumped off the page and landed in my heart, I said, oh God, that's for me. That's for me. I need you to think for me. I need you to guide and shepherd my life. And all he required of me to do was to entrust myself to him. And as I did, he began to teach me. teach me. And here I am today as a Bible teacher that it wasn't too far back. I told you I didn't even know where to go in the Bible to find anything in the Bible, but day by day, little by little, step by step, I Month after month, week after week, year after year, little here and a little there, I just keep giving myself over. I just keep presenting myself to the Lord. I keep turning it over to Him and saying, Lord, I'm yours. I'm yours to work in. I'm yours to work with. Lord, I need you to work for me. I need you to work through me. And Lord, would you use it beyond anything that I could possibly do myself. Lord, I just want to be the vessel. that you're showing things to. And when you show me something, and you pour something in me, it's so that I can go pour it out on other people. I can go give it away at your discretion. And as you lead me, I'll take what you give me and go give it away. And I believe if you're living like that yourself, this faith family will be of one voice. and one vision and standing on one verdict that thus says the Lord. That's where we want to stand and live. Amen. That we can walk with Him. But see, for God to speak life into me and continually speak life into me, I have to roll my works on Him. I have to commit to Him. That's a conditional truth there in the sense that There is no established thoughts. There is no renewing of the mind unless you are presenting your body unto the Lord. You're presenting your heart to Him, your mind to Him, all that you are. And when He opened, you open up the Word, you say, Lord, You've got my attention. You have my heart. I see what you show in me here. I hear what you show in me and therefore I can see your vision in this. And therefore, thank you for showing it to me. Now let me go declare it and show it to other people what you show in me. And all you do is take your testimony and throw it beside the Word of God. Say, this is what God said and this is how He changed me and conformed me to this. He used this to change me in my whatever it is. So when you think about that passage and you look at Proverbs 2, look in Proverbs 2. Man, it's already 12 o'clock, Brother Mike. We just getting cranked up, brother. Always got more to give than you got time to sit, amen. Look in chapter two, Proverbs two. Let me just show you this and we'll wrap these thoughts up. Discoveries. Discoveries usually are followed by breakthroughs. This community needs breakthroughs. Homes and families need breakthroughs. You ever prayed and just asked God to break through a situation? To break through and change a circumstance or whatever it is? Well, you see, breakthroughs just don't happen. Things are discovered. And on the coattails of a discovery comes the breakthrough. You got to discover light that could enter into that darkness. And it leads to breakthroughs like this, listen. He says, my son, if you receive my words and treasure my commands within you to the point that you incline your ear to what? And then you apply your heart to what? Yes, if you will cry out for discernment and lift up your voice for understanding. If you will seek her like you seek silver or to grow a crop. You see to grow a crop you grow a crop to put food on the table, right? And you study all these things how to be more efficient and better crop growers are better skilled in your jobs and we do all those things and there's nothing wrong with those things unless they take precedent over this thing of seeking the wisdom of God, amen. So that when I do do a thing, I do it in God's strength and His wisdom and not my own or what the world around me can teach me, amen. Look, he says, verse number four, if you seek her as silver and search for her as hidden treasures, notice the condition, then you will understand the fear of the Lord. Then you will find the knowledge of God. Why? For the Lord gives wisdom and from his mouth comes knowledge and understanding. He stores up sound wisdom for who? The upright, those living by faith. He is a shield to those who live by faith, therefore walking uprightly with Him. He guards the paths of justice and He preserves the way of His saints. Then you will understand righteousness and justice, equity and what? Every good path. What you find in Proverbs 2 is the if and the thens. If you do this, then you get this, and when you get this, this will be the result of it. And what that's saying is you can't approach that lightly. You have to give yourself entirely to it. And that's all He was telling Ezekiel. What? Look with the eyes, hear with the ears, apply your heart to everything that I show you. so that you, Ezekiel, can walk in it and then what? Declare it to the people. And you know what? When every one of you in Mary's city are applying your days in that way, you know what y'all gonna be? Y'all gonna be a group of people who continually be one voice, one vision, and one verdict. standing on what God has said, standing on what God has shown, standing on what God has given, and I want to tell you, it'd be one discovery after another, and one breakthrough after another, and you would see lives changed supernaturally by the glory of God. Amen? What a blessing. Now, does that take all of us? Yes. Does that take all of our efforts? Yes, it sure will. You see, if not, we just got men and women doing what natural men and women can do. And that's what was going on in Corinth. And eventually, what happens with that is one's gonna be over here, and one's gonna be over there, and one's got this idea, and this one's got that idea, and this one says I belong to this, and that one says I belong to that. And you know what they were doing? They were just butting heads. But really not magnifying Jesus. before the people they've been assigned to serve, amen. We don't wanna be there, do we? So I encourage you, make that commitment today that you're gonna roll your works and your thinking and your way, you're just gonna give them to Jesus, ask him to start thinking for you, knowing that he will and you trust what he gives you. and you live to edify and build up the people of God, amen. A few months ago, I walked through the book of Ezekiel in a personal study with our church. And when we was walking through there, there were five things that I discovered that became a breakthrough for me to teach other people on about Ezekiel's life. And then I see the pattern throughout the scriptures. That Ezekiel's name means strengthened by the Lord. And here's Ezekiel, a priest who had been dislocated from Jerusalem because of their rebellion and their ways, and now he's in Babylon. He's in a little place called Tel Aviv. And God comes to him with a message. And you watch Ezekiel walk with God through that entire book and that time. Jeremiah was back in Jerusalem. Daniel, Shadrach, and Meshach was with the royal people with Nebuchadnezzar. And here's this lone prophet with a group of people who didn't want to be where they were at in life, who had been displaced from their homes 1,500 miles away with all they had that was on their backs. And God was working in this man's life. And he wasn't a strong man. But God made him strong. How did God make him strong? There was five things we see. One, he was daily hearing the voice of God. God was speaking to him. He was seeing the visions of God. God was showing him what he was doing in Babylon, what he was doing in Jerusalem, what he was doing among the people, and what he would do later. Like we have the Word of God that shows us everything we need to see. God was speaking to him, God was showing him his victories, and Ezekiel was committed to God's vocation, his business. He was his messenger. He was in the business of God. I want to be in God's business, amen? He was celebrating the victories of God, though little here and a little there, and a big one here and a big one there. He just celebrated the victories of God. But then, as a way of life, he just kept sharing the verdicts of God. What God said about this, and what God said about that. And as he shared the verdict, celebrated the victories, committed to God's vocation, walking in God's vision and hearing God's voice, you know what God was doing? He was stretching the man. And I've come to realize that anybody I've ever been around that is strong in the Lord, growing in God, those five common denominators will always be there. They're hearing God's voice, seeing God's work, His vision. They're committed to it in their everyday life. They want to be part of it. They wanna be in the work with it. They committed to it. When God brings a little victory in their life or their neighbor's life, man, they celebrate it, rejoice and praise God over it. And then they just simply live every day sharing the verdicts that God's been planting in them. And man, he goes from this hideaway prophet to a man with a great word that God gives us that's still speaking today, amen. because he shared the verdicts that God put in his heart. I encourage you to do the same thing. And man, it will make all the difference in your life, in your neighbor's life, in your church family's life, and how you represent Jesus in this community. Amen. Those folks out there that are not part of the kingdom yet, their prayers are an abomination to the Lord. Their sacrifices are an abomination to the Lord. Their thinking is an abomination to the Lord. Proverbs 15 tells us all that, but you know who has an ear with God? Those that fear the Lord, amen. So instead of looking down on them, you know what we need to start doing? Interceding for them. Instead of talking bad about them, you know what we do? We bring a good news to them and help them. They may not receive it today. That's okay, you know what we're gonna do? We're gonna love them anyway, amen? They may push us and mock at us and laugh at us. You know what we're gonna do? We're gonna bless them anyway. And we'll come back tomorrow or maybe the next day, amen? Hey, hey, I see you, yeah. We're gonna keep going to them. This little one here starts crying. What are we going to do? We're not going to go throw him in the back and leave him back there by himself, right? No. Let him cry. Amen. Let them make all the noise they want. The world's going to make all the noise they want to. You just keep loving on them. You keep leading them to Jesus. It may not be today, it may not be next week, it may not be next month, it may not be next year, but you're waiting on the Lord to do a work that they can't do themselves apart from Him. You wait on Him to do that, amen? And you ask God to keep using you, why? Because y'all standing with one voice, one vision of what God's given you to do. One verdict, Jesus is King. He's the shepherd. He's God. Every other person is a liar. until they otherwise stand on the authority of the Word of God. Amen? Stand with Jesus and let Him use you. Today you may be in here, you've never trusted Him with your life. You may have never trusted Him. You see, Jesus lived a life you couldn't live. Because you were bent towards sin. You can't live the life that He lived. But He lived the life He lived and the life He lived qualified Him to die. The death that He died. And the death that He died God says that's enough to qualify you to receive the life that He lived when you put your faith in Him, amen? God'll take your sin and then give you His righteousness simply by putting your faith in Him, amen? You just trust, you entrust yourself to Him. You go from being ungodly sinner to the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. who's been granted new life in Him. And now you have fertile ground with a new nature in you that God can plant the heavenly seed of the Word of God by the Spirit of God into your heart. And now that fruit's gonna start blossoming out of your life as you walk with Him. Amen? Man, that's a pretty good deal, Brother Mike. It's the best deal that any of us will ever welcome or go give away. It's the deal of a lifetime, amen. Now, will it cost you? Oh, it'll cost you. But you know what? Not trusting Him will cost you too. And that's the price you can't pay, amen. You let Him pay your price. Let Him be your life and let Him set you free. So, Brother Mike's gonna come and I'm gonna pray and we'll let him lead in this time, okay? So, let us pray. Father, we bless you. Thank you for this time we've had this morning. Thank you for this weekend, what was planned. Now we ask you at this moment that you withdraw those that you have already brought conviction to. They realized they were living in unbelief, and Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. That He is righteous, and that has been validated by His resurrection. And that the enemy of this world and everything attached to him has been judged. but you are able to set the unsafe, rebellious enemies of God, you're able to set them free when they see that you are better than anything and anyone. So Lord, draw them to you today and do your work. And for those that are here that are yours, I pray you would let them commit themselves to you and make themselves available to you in this service today to start thinking for them. In Jesus' name, amen. There's nothing more important than what's happening right now in the hearts and lives of people in this room. Some people have just realized this morning, by seeing God's Word and hearing God's Word, that they're lost and eternally separated from God. If that's you this morning, I want you to come to Jesus. Come to Jesus this morning. Maybe what you saw and heard from God's Word this morning was, I know Jesus. I am saved, but I so desperately need to make myself available to him so that I can be used to declare his word to my family and to my community, to my school, to my coworkers. I don't know what God has revealed to you today, but I do know this. The ball is in your court. It is time for you to respond to what He is teaching you or what He has taught you. So let's stand together and sing, but you come, you be obedient to God as He leads. All to Jesus I surrender All to Him I freely give I will ever love and trust Him In His presence daily give I surrender all. I surrender all. All to Thee, my blessed Savior, I surrender all.