Many of you know we have a worship
and prayer conference coming up.
So those listening live or listening to this
later, you're more than welcome to join us.
It's March 15th and 16th.
It's a Friday, it's a Saturday.
And kind of preparing for that, I have
a few messages from the book of Zephaniah.
It's gonna be up on the screen.
The title is The Road to Revival.
The Road to Revival.
And tonight we're gonna talk about the messenger
and next week more on the message of
Zephaniah.
And then what happens on the 13th here?
Worship night.
So Chris and his band are gonna be
here for almost two hours and I hope
you came to worship or are going to
come to worship because that's what we plan
to do.
But tonight I'm gonna talk about the messenger,
Zephaniah.
It's important as we build this road to
revival.
And starting Monday, those of us who can
make it are gonna be here at six
in the morning for about an hour and
a half every single day for worship, for
morning worship, for those who can make it.
I know it's a drive for some of
you and many people work, but for those
of you who can, even on Saturday we'll
be doing this, on Sunday we'll be doing
this obviously.
And Zephaniah, what he did, he ministered in
the southern kingdom.
Israel was broken up and he was in
the southern kingdom.
He was down below in the southern area
of Israel with King Josiah and he can
trace his lineage back to his great-grandfather
Hezekiah.
Many of you know Hezekiah, he was a
good king.
And Zephaniah, the reason these prophets are so
important, the minor prophets, smaller books, the major
prophets, larger books like Ezekiel, Jeremiah, Isaiah, is
because they have a message for us today.
You know the old saying, if it's new,
it's not true.
And if it's true, it's not new.
And we can gleam a lot from these
Old Testament prophets because the message hasn't changed
and the messenger hasn't really changed.
We have to go back to these old
paths.
And I like what Checks Wendell said about
Zephaniah.
He grew up under the reign of the
evil, evil King Manasseh and underneath Manasseh's son,
Amnon, or Ammon.
As a young man, the prophet-to-be
would have been surrounded by the trappings of
idolatry, child sacrifice, and unjust killings, strong influences
on a young mind.
And as a result, a prophet is born
in Zephaniah.
And that's usually the furnace that a prophet
will go through.
Somebody called by God, they'll be given a
tremendous burden.
Without that burden, you don't have a lot
of passionate preaching.
Through that pain, through that burden, God will
take his men, his women, and give them
the strong message to deliver to his people.
So he was there in the trappings of
idolatry, child sacrifice, and unjust killings.
Sound familiar?
I don't know about you, but it's hard
for me to even watch the news lately.
We have people, the next, running for the
President of the United States, running for the
President of the United States voted against helping
children born out of a botched abortion.
So if abortion doesn't work out and the
child is stillborn, living, vibrant, can live, they
can actually decide to kill that child.
It's just amazing to see how far we've
drifted.
And God will bring strong voices, strong messengers,
because what happens is conviction stirs the pot
of revival.
Without conviction, you're not going to see revival.
So the messenger is vitally important.
And that's why I often joke sometimes about
some of the people we watch on TV
and they have a purpose, and maybe God
has used them in different areas.
But if you're going to spark revival, it's
gonna have to be convicting.
It's gonna have to resonate deep within our
hearts and what we're seeing in our nation
today and even in the church today, drifting.
Leonard Ravenhill, he said this in his book,
Why Revival Terry's.
God has always had his specialists like Zephaniah,
whose chief concern has been the moral breakdown
of the nation and the church.
Such men were Elisha, Jeremiah, Malachi, and others
of their kind who appeared at critical moments
in history.
Isn't that interesting?
God would raise up his prophets at critical
times in history.
He would raise them up, why?
To rebuke, to exhort in the name of
God and righteousness.
Such a man is likely to be drastic
and radical.
The curious crowd that gathers to watch him
will soon brand him as extreme, fanatical, and
negative.
And in a sense, they are right, for
he cannot turn off the burden of the
Holy Ghost.
And I'm actually gonna quote a few more
people here because what I'm trying to do,
I'm trying to set the stage to tell
us and those watching how important it is
for more messengers to rise up.
More people with that burden of the Holy
Spirit to rise up and say something.
And we have to be careful because we'll
start to think, well, I can't really make
a difference.
I mean, Shane, you have a platform.
Well, there's people with larger platforms than me
reaching even many more people.
And it's really not the platform or the
audience that God is looking at, he's looking
at the heart.
He's looking at the messenger.
If you give me your heart, I can
raise you up.
I can allow you to be that voice.
What about that voice on Facebook?
I mean, there's a good out of that.
It's not just evil.
And what about YouTube or in your own
sphere of influence or at your work, being
that messenger or in your communities, being that
difference maker?
God is not concerned about numbers.
He doesn't care about your platform or my
platform.
He says, I'll use you in whatever sphere
I've called you in.
And I used to just not get too
motivated myself because even starting out at church,
we just started out.
We didn't have hardly anything going on.
Like, oh Lord, I mean, I'm preaching to
the choir every Sunday.
And God says, just keep preaching to the
choir because they need to hear it.
And it'll spark revival.
Revival sparks in our own hearts.
And maybe I should clarify that word for
some of you.
I have before.
But revival, what do you think of when
you hear the word revival?
I think of awakening or renewal or resuscitation
or restoring.
And it's actually, it comes from a word
to revive something that was once alive but
now is dead.
And that's why the prayer went out in
the Old Testament.
Oh Lord, will thou not revive us again
so that we can rejoice in you?
So it's spiritual resuscitation.
You know, the person who's dying and you
give them CPR and you're reviving.
They're flatlining, now they're back.
Folks, the church has flatlined.
The nation, the moral compass of our nation
has flatlined.
Unless God brings revival, that is our only
hope.
That's why I'm passionate about this, I think
for two reasons.
Number one, he's called me in this area.
That's why not everybody has this type of
calling that I feel this burden that God
has given me, number one.
Number two, I truly feel that this is
our only hope.
The Titanic has hit the iceberg.
It's taking on water.
The only hope is God reviving his people.
And I take great comfort in that because
God would raise up a Zephaniah.
He would raise up a Elisha.
He would raise up Zachariah.
He would raise up a Jeremiah.
Before Jeremiah was even born, he said, I
formed you.
Jeremiah, I formed you in your mother's womb.
That's why we can't take life at conception.
God formed that child.
He said, I formed you in your mother's
womb.
And what did I do?
I called you to be a prophet to
the nations.
To what?
To rise up, to pull up, to encourage,
but also to pluck out and remove the
evil of the people.
And he'll raise up these people to bring
convicting messages.
The messenger is so important.
So I'm hoping to rattle some cages this
evening.
I'm hoping to have you say, you know
what?
I want that.
God, I want to make a difference.
I want to be that voice.
And that's all he needs.
I remember 1999, I can tell you the
street.
I can tell you I was hungover.
I was watching television.
I was losing everything.
And there was a message on TV that
rattled my cages.
It convicted me.
And I said, but God, I want that.
I want to do that.
I want the calling that that man has
to call men and the church back to
you.
But who am I?
I'm sitting here drunk.
God will honor your heart to make a
difference.
Can you imagine if we all just went
out and made a difference in our community?
It catches like fire.
Correctional officers, sheriffs, community organizers, politicians, aerospace.
I see all kinds of people in this
room.
Can you imagine if we said, here's all
you have to say.
God, here I am.
Use me.
And that's, God's gonna spark because that's what
revival is.
It's reviving his church.
It's reviving his people.
And revival really isn't primarily about salvations.
Those follow, those come, but the main thrust
of revival is for God to revive his
people.
They are dead.
They are going through the motions and God
revives them.
This, from being dead and barren to now
this fire, this heavy, because I know, I
lived 15 years not doing anything for God.
I was a Christian, but I didn't talk
to anybody about Jesus.
Looking back, I'm like, I can't believe it.
And then he revives you and you have
all this passion now.
That's what we need.
We need revival to spread the message of
the gospel and of hope.
And it's okay to say this because I
don't think they're watching, but there's somebody in
church I haven't seen in here in a
couple years.
And I sent them a message, said, great
to see you.
Hope to see you again.
And he said, we'll make it now and
then, but we're so busy with travel while
with sports.
And you wonder why we're dying spiritually.
You wonder why kids are walking away.
Because that's idolatry.
That is absolute idolatry.
Now, of course, do sports, have fun.
Please, coach, I did.
I'm not talking about that.
But anytime that begins to replace God and
that becomes your God and you'll get to
church when you can, we have to be
careful.
See, that's meant to be convicting because it
stirs and it convicts us.
I think we passed out an article I
wrote this week, another kind of religious leader
must arise.
And it's out on the national media this
week.
I've got some emails about it.
But I said a few things.
Let me just quote a few things.
Those who have been called to preach, much
like the prophets in the Old Testament, will
confront compromise.
They will condemn moral digression and powerfully denounce
sin in the hope of reconciling man to
God.
They speak the truth in love.
And the world and carnal Christians despise them
because they challenge the sin they enjoy.
And I guess another title that might have
been even better is prophets are popular.
They never will be.
Anybody that speaks for God.
And that's, I guess I should clarify that
term too.
When we talk about now in the New
Testament, we don't believe, I don't believe that
the office of a prophet, the Old Testament
prophet, that office is still there, but the
calling, that God gives somebody a prophetic type
of calling where you have Greg Laurie, he's
more evangelism.
Billy Graham, more evangelism.
You have Leonard Ravenhill or A.W. Tozer,
more prophetic.
You have those who have different giftings and
different callings.
But God will raise up that person.
All pastors should ask this question though.
I would love for these large churches to
ask this question.
Does the world love the way you do
church?
Do they appreciate that your church never challenges
or calls things into question?
Do they like the fact that your church
never makes them feel uncomfortable or offended?
Are they grateful that you never discuss controversial
issues?
That, my friends, is not a church.
We have to remember that the church is
for believers to come and be built up
to worship God and to be strengthened and
to go out.
What happens is we start to change things
around for the world.
And what happens is you will dumb down
the gospel.
You lose that fire.
I remember there's a pastor, he stepped down.
Now he started church again, I think in
North or South Carolina.
But he always had secular music on.
During church service, the first song or two
because of the people coming in.
He played Highway to Hell by ACDC on
Easter.
Can you imagine, Chris, can you come up
and do Highway to Hell?
I'm on a high, and you just, I'm
sure you probably could, but is that healthy?
Is that beneficial?
Is that gonna honor God?
See, this is why we're in the predicament
we're in, catering to the world.
Instead of asking what does the world want
to hear, we should be saying what do
they need to hear?
What do they need to hear?
That doesn't mean mean-spirited and angry, but
to truly love them.
That's how we've gotten in this condition that
we're in.
A.W. Tozer said if Christianity is to
receive a rejuvenation, does it need that today?
Absolutely.
It must be by other means than is
now being used.
If the church in the second half of
this century is to recover from the injury
she suffered in the first half, there must
appear a new type of preacher.
He's talking about the land of the 1900s
now, but obviously we're fast-forwarding.
He concludes, this person will stand in flat
contradiction to everything our smirking, smooth civilization holds
dear.
He will contradict, denounce, and protest in the
name of God, and he will earn the
hatred and opposition of a large segment of
Christianity.
That is true.
The church as a whole hates the voice
crying in the wilderness.
The remnant loves it, but the church as
a whole hates that voice crying in the
wilderness.
Such a man is likely to be lean
and rugged, blunt-spoken, and a little bit
angry with the world.
He will love Christ and the souls of
men to the point of willing to die
for the glory of the one and the
salvation of the other, but he will fear
nothing that breathes with mortal breath.
And there was voices saying this for many
years, that the church needs to be revived
again.
We need pastors to walk up to the
pulpits with the burden of the Holy Spirit.
I don't know, many people don't know what
that is, but the burden of the Lord
is this burden, this weight, you've been spending
time with God, you're pregnant with the word
of God.
You're actually pregnant with the word of God.
My wife will say it's not even close,
and I agree, but there's this burden, you
walk up, and you feel the intensity of
God's Spirit on what's going on in the
culture, in the nation, in the church, and
you must speak into the lives of others.
But many people come up and they wanna
just be smooth and not offend, and things
I've talked about before, but national revival begins
with individual revival.
National revival begins with individual revival.
We need more messengers filled with the Spirit
of God.
Not everybody agrees with this statement, and that's
okay, because we're allowed to disagree as pastors,
I'm talking about pastors now, but I truly
believe that a pastor, a preacher, a teacher,
whatever you wanna call it, filled mightily with
the Spirit of God will inevitably convict people.
There's no way around that.
The Holy Spirit has been called the hound
of heaven, and when that hound is let
loose, he convicts, he draws people to God.
It's impossible to come up and preach God's
Word and not convict, and that's what you're
seeing in the culture, they're trying to silence
the church.
They started with separation of church and state,
and they begin to grow into other things
where they don't want you to talk about
controversial things.
If you get the wrong people in office,
you'll see soon enough where everything I'm saying
tonight, it will be labeled hate speech.
As soon as you start to say that
lifestyle is a sin, you're a hater.
See, remove the voice of truth, remove the
conviction.
Tell us soothing words, tender words that comfort
us in our sin.
So let's look at Zephaniah chapter one.
They're gonna have it up on the screen.
The first thing we wanna talk about is
the warnings.
Now, it's interesting, prophets, and writing minor and
major prophets, I'm sure most of you are
aware they didn't have whiteout back then, or
backspace, or delete.
So not everything is in order.
The Spirit of God would just flow from
their pen.
They would write.
I'm sure they have a couple chapters, and
they're like, I'm not cleaning this up.
This is the way it is.
Thus saith the Lord.
So sometimes, chapter one and chapter three, there's
some condemnations and then some encouragement in between,
but overall, the warning is crystal clear.
Think about this.
This week, this amazed me.
I went on a long walk and just
thought about this.
This is God's Word.
God said it.
He told them to write it down.
The Bible's the number one best-selling book
of all time.
Nobody even comes, no book even comes close,
but nobody wants to read these things.
You will not find many churches, and anytime
I say that, I'm not trying to puff
up West Side whatsoever.
There are great churches out there.
I'm not saying that.
Even sometimes it's difficult for me to read,
but this is God's Word.
This is what He wants to say.
I will utterly consume everything from the face
of the land, says the Lord.
Oh, it's a nice way to start the
chapter.
I will consume man and beast.
I will consume the birds of the heavens
and the fish of the sea and the
stumbling blocks along with the wicked.
I will cut off man from the face
of the land, thus saith the Lord.
See, I believe that if you had more
pulpits saying that, reading that, you hearing that,
people might, what was that?
What did He say?
I don't have this, I have this view
of God as a ball of love.
Have you felt that before from others?
He's a cosmic ball of love, or a
big Santa Claus, or up in the sky,
or a genie in a bottle of this
just, but that's not God.
And if people would understand this is the
true and living God.
I will cut off man from the face
of the land, says the Lord.
Isn't it interesting?
We understand human judges.
If you go to the courthouse, if you
see someone, you know someone who was guilty
of something, let's say murder, and you know
it.
What about those serial killers?
Just that have been in the news in
the past, and obviously will in the future.
We see them, we want justice.
Don't we?
We see a police officer killed, want justice.
So why, though, when it comes to God,
as the ultimate judge, we don't wanna view
Him as a judge?
The world doesn't, majority of the church doesn't.
Remember under the banner of love?
But if you understand that the wages of
sin is death, and what sin is and
what it does, there has to be justice
served.
Isn't that interesting?
We have sinned, and unbelievers that don't know
Christ, they have sinned against God.
There's no way around that.
Justice has to be served.
The gavel is going to fall, and execution
will take place.
Now the cross makes sense.
See, justice has been served.
And people get so mad, they say, oh,
Shane, that's so negative.
Nobody's gonna wanna hear you.
Yeah, I think they are gonna wanna hear,
because they understand, they feel the wrath and
condemnation of God.
They don't know what it is.
They wanna release, so you point them to
the cross.
See, justice has been paid.
When you explain the price of sin, it
isn't the cost of sin.
Justice makes sense.
So that's what he's talking about here.
It's saying justice will have to occur.
And I've noticed this.
Some of you, I'm sure.
Anytime we're in rebellion against God, resources are
often dried up to get our attention.
Resources.
I will consume this, God says.
I will consume that.
I will remove this.
Our resources begin to dwindle, and things are
dried up, things that we used to count
on.
Back then, it was the rain.
God says, I'll hold back the latter rain
and the former rain.
I will devastate your crops.
I will lick up every vital nutrient that
you could consume, and it'll be just parched
ground.
Why would you do that to get the
people's attention?
Really, judgment often is purification.
The irony is God is talking to his
people.
He'll talk to the nations in a different
chapter, but he's talking to his people.
I've quoted that verse before where God, when
he finally judged Jerusalem, he said, I sent
my messengers.
I sent my prophets, rising them up early
and sending them because I had compassion on
my people and on my dwelling place.
Did they listen?
No, they mocked my messengers, they despised my
word, and they scoffed at my prophets until
the anger of the Lord arose against his
own people.
So when God brings judgment, often it's for
purification.
It isn't God saying, oh, man, I'm just
gonna annihilate everyone.
Scorched earth theory becomes true.
I'm gonna put the sun 20 million miles
closer.
I'm just gonna wipe you out.
No, he brings judgment for purification.
Because you know, when the heat's turned up,
we often go back to God.
When things are going great, don't ask to
be tested in this area, but watch your
business start to plummet.
Watch your finances start to have holes in
the money bag.
Watch everything start to fall apart.
What's happening?
Oh, then we turn to God.
So God knows us, and he'll use certain
things to get our attention again.
And he said, I will stretch out my
hand against Judah and against all the inhabitants
of Jerusalem.
I will cut off every trace of Baal
from this place.
See, God defends himself.
I will remove Baal, he says.
You Baal worshipers, you kissed his image, you
worship this little statue of Baal.
I will remove Baal.
There's no God but me, he says.
The names of the idolatrous priests with the
pagan priests.
So you have priests that were representing God,
but they have become idolatrous.
They are doing it for the money or
doing it for the recognition or they started
to drift from God.
Those who worship the host of heavens on
the housetops, those who worship and swear oath
by the Lord, but who also swear by
Milcom.
Well, what does that mean, Shane?
Well, glad you asked.
Host of heaven, obviously, is the stars and
the moon and the sun, and they would
go on the roofs and they would look
at these and they would worship these things.
And it's amazing.
They're worshiping the creation, but not the creator
who created them.
And Milcom is interesting.
They were double-minded.
They would swear by God, but they would
swear by Milcom.
What is Milcom?
Well, you might know it as Molech.
These people, children of God, would put wood
in this iron statue and get this fire
blazing, it would be red hot, and they
would sacrifice their children on the arms of
Molech.
And God says, you're doing things that haven't
even entered my mind.
Severe decline is when we worship anything but
God.
You can tell people are declining when they
worship anything but God.
Are we not seeing that today?
What is happening with abortion is much deeper
than just abortion.
It's idolatry.
Sexual idolatry, plain and simple.
Do what I want, when I want, how
I want, without any ramifications.
Not to mention the massive amounts of money
behind this industry.
If you just, I mean, sometimes I can't
even process this, that this whole thing that
came out with selling baby parts, that happens.
They'll tell you how much, 15,000 for
this, or 25,000 for, they sell these
to different hospitals and organizations that run tests
and try to, you know, come up with
different vaccines or different things.
They need abortive tissue, and it's just unbelievable.
And you see that in a society that
they'll start to worship anything but God.
Those who have turned back from following the
Lord, I'm reading here still, and have not
sought the Lord nor inquired of Him, be
silent in the presence of the Lord God,
for the day of the Lord is at
hand, for the Lord has prepared a sacrifice.
He has invited His guests.
So it's interesting, anytime you turn away from
God, He says, be silent and listen.
And it doesn't necessarily mean just, which is
good, but remove all the distractions.
Quiet your mouth, quiet your heart, quiet your
mind, remove all the distractions, be silent and
listen to Me, your God, He says.
For the day of the Lord is at
hand, the Lord has prepared a sacrifice, He
has invited His guests.
As soon as I read this, I thought
of Luke 14, 16.
I think there's a parallel.
It's when Jesus said that there's a certain
man preparing a great banquet and inviting many
guests, He's talking about God.
And at the time of the banquet, His
servant went out to all the people that
were chosen, that God selected.
But they all alike began to make excuses.
The first said, I have just bought a
field and I must go back and see
it, please excuse me.
So God is inviting them to this feast,
God's saying come and partake, come and fellowship
with Me, but work and busyness sidetrack these
people.
No, no, no, no, no, I just bought
a field.
And when they would buy a field, they
would go and they would move all those
big boulders and all the trees and the
tree stumps, and it was a lot of
work.
Now we can just go rent a bulldozer,
a Cat 10 or D10, and just knock
down everything.
I love driving a bulldozer and just annihilate
the dirt in a day, what would take
them months sometimes.
So they'd have to go and prepare that
field to plant the crops and plant the
different wheat and barley and different things.
So they'd say no, I can't go, they're
making excuses.
So how much in our own lives is
work and busyness drawing us away from God?
And another person said, I've just bought five
yoke of oxen and I'm on my way
to try them out, please excuse me.
Financial pursuit.
See, people have all these excuses, all these
excuses.
Why can't we fully surrender God and worship
him more?
I'm busy, I've gotta do this, I've gotta
be here.
Still another said, I just got married, so
I can't come.
Relational distractions.
Like I said earlier about that person who
put that sports in front of God.
The servant came back and reported to his
master, then the owner of the house became
angry and ordered his servant and said, go
out quickly into the street and alleys of
the town and bring in the poor, the
crippled, the blind, the lame.
I will tell you, not one of those
who are invited will get a taste of
my banquet.
So the analogy really is Jesus coming, his
own people not receiving him, and then God
says, go out and open up to the
Gentiles, to all mankind, come to the banquet,
the feast is ready.
So there's a choice there, there's a choice
involved in pursuing God.
And then Zephaniah, verses 12 and 13.
And it shall come to pass at that
time that I will search Jerusalem with lamps
and punish the men who are settled in
complacency.
Are you complacent tonight?
I came to wake up your complacency.
A complacent Christian, what is that?
Did you know there's no such thing?
Complacency, what does complacency mean?
A feeling of smug with oneself or one's
achievements.
I'm comfortable, I'm complacent, I'm good.
And I know, I used to sit in
the pew, and I know it's easy to
become complacent, isn't it?
Even up here, all of us, there's something
in us called the flesh that loves to
just be complacent.
Who say in their heart, the Lord will
not do good, nor will the Lord do
evil.
See, what happens is we become complacent, and
that's why I've often said that we are
confusing now God's patience with his approval.
That's what we're seeing in our nation today,
in the churches, we're confusing, ah, God is
approving this, no, he's patient.
And so they even said this back then,
the Lord will not do good, nor will
he do evil.
We can do whatever we want.
Therefore, their goods shall become booty, and their
houses a desolation.
In other words, they'll lose everything to an
army.
I believe it was Babylonians who came in
and destroyed, Zephaniah doesn't talk about that, but
other prophets mentioned that Babylonians came in and
destroyed these people.
They shall build houses, but not inhabit them.
They shall plant vineyards, but not drink their
wine.
So this is Zephaniah speaking to the children
of Israel.
Can you imagine somebody telling you this?
Guys, listen, you've drifted from God.
Your house is that you built, you're not
going to live in.
You're complacent, you're worshiping all these other gods,
except the true God.
Wake up.
They think that God is neutral, and they
will build, but not benefit.
They will plant, but not harvest.
And then I'm gonna skip to chapter three,
verse one.
Woe to her rebellious children.
Woe to her who is rebellious and polluted.
To the oppressing city, she has not obeyed
His voice.
This is so interesting to me, because the
world, especially America, try airing this message in
New York or Hollywood, or San Francisco.
Just try it for a half hour and
see what happens.
Right, the Lord is saying, return to Me,
give up your idols, but they will not
obey His voice as if they can fight
God, and they can't fight God.
She has not received correction, she has not
trusted in the Lord, she has not drawn
near to her God.
So the people became bitter and hard.
Maybe that's for someone here tonight.
Have you become bitter and hard?
It can happen to Christians, or those professing
to know Christ.
Life can make us bitter and hard, amen?
So what can prevent that tenderness and brokenness?
Woe to her who is rebellious and polluted
to the oppressing city, he's talking about Jerusalem.
She has not obeyed His voice, she has
not received correction.
She has not trusted in the Lord, she
has not drawn near to her God.
This is what I loved about God.
He would tell the people, listen, you're not
going down a good path, judgment's not coming
today, but it will come if you don't
turn, don't redirect yourself.
He'll bring the prophets, He'll bring the Isaiah's
and the Jeremiah's and the Ezekiel's and Joel
and Amos and Obadiah, and He'll bring these
people, and God's saying, I'm warning, I'm warning,
I'm trying to wake you up, but they
keep pushing away, and they do not hear
His voice.
Her princesses in the midst are like roaring
lions, her judges are evening wolves that leave
not a bone till morning.
Her prophets are insolent, treacherous people.
So He's saying these princes, these rulers of
your city, that are supposed to be good
and God-honoring, they are treacherous.
Sound familiar?
Boy, if I had time, I could tell
you about some of the leaders that are
leading us.
Her priests, people called of God have polluted
the sanctuary.
So many churches around our nation are polluting
the sanctuary, they're bringing things in that ought
not be there, mocking God, they've done violence
to the law.
The Lord is righteous in her midst, He
will do no unrighteousness.
Every morning He brings His justice to light,
never fails, but the unjust, they know no
shame.
So in a nutshell, the leaders are ruthless,
judges are bought, and the prophets and priests
are false prophets.
That's how you damage the law.
I mean, technically, you can't damage God's law,
but what you do is you damage it
in the laws of people.
You say God doesn't care, God isn't concerned
about what you're doing, but we know God
is not mocked, whatever a man sows, he
will also reap.
So that's the messenger, and that was the
message that he received from God.
Zephaniah was a messenger, the message that he
received from God was no different than it
is today.
Stop worshiping false idols, stop polluting your mind,
stop becoming complacent in your sin, and return
back to me.
It's the same message.
And I'm gonna get into this more next
Wednesday, but I'm gonna talk about next Wednesday
the reflection.
What I mean by that is self-reflection.
So what we're supposed to do when we
hear a message like this is reflect, and
that's why if you do preach messages like
this to the, this is an easy audience
right here, but if you preach to a
difficult audience, like sometimes what you'll see Ray
Comfort does on videos, or other people, and
you preach to a difficult audience, nine times
out of 10, they will hate you, they
will mock you, but God's looking for that
one or two people who are listening who
will pick this in and receive it.
It's self-reflection.
That's the whole point of the messages being
difficult.
Think about it.
If God's people were drifting from him, they're
into sin, they love sin, how would he
call them out of that?
Would he say, hey, good job, keep going.
Nothing bad's gonna happen, just keep on with
it.
I'm winking, I'll wink at you up in
heaven.
But remember, that's a sign of a what?
False prophet.
The false proclaimers would say, don't worry about
it.
That's why I cringe at all these pastors
supporting gay marriage, and transgender, and homosexuality, and
they're supporting it.
I'm not talking about being there for them,
loving them, pointing them to the truth.
I'm talking about actually supporting, and validating it,
and twisting scriptures.
That is a false prophet according to God's
word.
Yeah, that statement might put me in jail
in a decade from now, I'm well aware
of that.
There's YouTube, it's gonna live on forever.
But see, we love people enough to tell
them the truth, not mock them, but to
say, hey, this is the truth according to
God's word.
You cannot escape that, you cannot redefine it,
you can't remove it.
So what happens is there's self-reflection.
I believe that when people hear the truth,
they're gonna reflect more than you think they
are.
They might not right then and there, but
they will go home and they'll, you just
planted the seed, and what happens when you
plant the seed?
Do you have to go and water it
every time?
No, somebody else may water it, and God
may water it.
So here's the practical application for tonight.
Have you noticed how much praying, oh, actually,
I'm gonna quote Tozer again, told you I
quote a lot of people.
I want you all to think about this
statement.
Not if you're hungry, don't look at your
phone, what time is it, what are we
doing?
Listen to this.
Tozer said this, have you noticed how much
praying for revival has been going on lately
and how little revival has resulted?
I think he's onto something.
Have you noticed how much praying for revival
has been going on lately and how little
revival has resulted?
Let's be honest.
There's revival conferences, there's revival messages, there's books
on revival, everybody's talking about revival, praying for
revival, and that's good, but I have to
agree with him.
He said, I believe the problem is that
we have been trying to substitute praying for
obeying, and it simply will not work.
To pray for revival while ignoring the plain
precepts laid down in Scripture is to waste
a lot of words and get nothing done
for our trouble.
Prayer will become effective when we stop using
it as a substitute for obedience.
Now, I've been around long enough to tell
you that he is absolutely spot on.
There are so many people that they'll pray,
but they will not obey.
Shane, can you be specific?
Yes, there are areas in our lives, I
believe in many lives of people, where God
is convicting, God is showing you areas where
repentance needs to take place, and until that
happens, until that repentance happens, and that obedience
happens in that area that God is convicting
you, you will not, you cannot see personal
revival.
That's just the truth.
We must heed the primary call of revival,
and that is repentance.
These calls are to God's people.
I'm gonna end with 1 Kings 8.28.
I don't think we have it up there.
Just take this in for a minute.
Yet regard the prayer of your servant and
his supplication.
Oh Lord, my God, and listen to the
cry and the prayer which your servant is
praying before you today.
That's the key.
Listen, oh God, listen to the prayer.
Listen to the prayer of your servant.
Can you say that tonight, or are you
bored?
Can you say that tonight, or are you
upset?
Can you say that tonight, or are you
so complacent that nothing is breaking in?
God says, no, cry out to me right
here.
I will hear your prayer.
Oh Lord, my God, listen to the cry
and the prayer which your servant is praying
for you today.
We need more people saying that.
Lord, hear our prayer this evening, or Sunday
mornings, whenever it is.
Lord, hear our prayer.
Save our churches, save our nation.
God, save the unborn.
Hear our prayer.
There must be a passionate burden for the
things of God.
But the good news is, if you don't
have that, pray for it.
Say, Lord, give me that burden.
Give me that passion.
Give me, I'm tired of complacency.
Listen, I remember those years.
Those years of terrible, boring Christianity, complacent Christianity
where we're not witnessing, we're not filled with
the spirit of God, we're not filled with
boldness.
We'll listen to a few Christian songs, and
we'll go to work, and we'll show up
for church, and that's the extent of our
Christianity.
But God wants to do so much more
in hearts that are willing and ready.