The job of a pastor is to make men do what they don't want to do in order to achieve what they've always wanted to be. See, I truly believe my job is to help pull out of you what is already inside of you. To be a coach, to be a cheerleader, to be somebody who encourages. It hurts sometimes, doesn't it? This message is not popular, but it is powerful. Never confuse the two. Many messages that are popular, sermons preached across this United States of America, preached on TV, you can turn, they're very popular, they're not powerful. And if it's powerful, it's not popular. Because to get powerful, to be, I might stop preaching in a minute, I'm just saying, to get powerful, right, to get filled with the spirit of God, it's never popular. Nothing is popular to the culture and to the lukewarm church when you talk about dying to self and fasting and giving of self and going without. Go watch a movie on the persecuted church and see people filled mightily with the Spirit of God. It's never popular. Never popular. Because the culture is often going in the opposite direction of God. In every generation, A.W. Tozer said, in every generation, the holy and the faithful are very small. Be sure that you are among them. In order to have a powerful message of God, it's not popular. You would take a powerful prophet in the Old Testament. Do you think their message was popular with the people? They stoned them, they killed them, they threw them in prison. The kings would search after them. Jezebel wanted to kill Elisha. It's never popular. It's never popular, so that's why you can't gauge a church by attendance alone. I can take you to churches with thousands of people. The messages are popular, but they're not powerful. Many are singing and clapping, but nobody's being changed from the inside out. Carnality is being fed and fueled. Lukewarm living is being encouraged. So always remember that.
Westside Christian Fellowship is a non-denominational Christian church that meets every every Sunday at 9:00 am & 11:00 am in Leona Valley, California (9306 Leona Avenue).