Lord, from the wicked enticements of this age,
Lord, deliver them, Lord.
We pray, God, have mercy.
Don't let them, Lord, follow the strange gods
that this culture are worshipping, Lord, the gods
of money, the gods of materialism, the gods
of self and self-preservation and the god
of pride and thinking that we're the most
important person in the world and the god
of selfish ambition where we think that the
purpose of our existence is to fulfill our
own lusts and our own desires.
Oh God, please, we beg You, Lord, for
the sake of Your Son to preserve our
children.
And Lord, we ask that You'll forgive us
for so many times modeling a lifestyle and
an attitude that is less than holy in
Your eyes.
And then, Lord, we get upset with our
children when in fact they're just imitating the
worldly hearts that we have taught them.
Give us the courage, Lord, to repent and
acknowledge our sin.
Give us the courage, Lord, to be transparent
and to be willing to see the areas
of our life that need to be readjusted
and to be corrected.
Give us the strength and faith, Lord, to
make changes.
Help us, Lord, to make changes, not to
hear the Word and not be a doer
of the Word.
Deliver us from this snare, Lord, where we
deceive ourselves.
Now, Lord, we pray You'll just continue with
the power of the Holy Spirit.
We acknowledge, Lord, that our sufficiency is in
God and not in ourself.
We acknowledge, oh God, that any glory would
go to the Lord Jesus Christ.
We tremble at the thought of ever wanting
the creature to be glorified, Lord.
Any of us, Lord.
We tremble at the thought of wanting to
be bigger than the foot of the cross,
Lord.
We pray, God, You'll deliver us from these
inherent tendencies to want to exalt ourself above
our brother, above our sister, above our husband,
above our wife.
Oh, God, help us to realize that You
alone are the Exalted One in Heaven.
You alone.
We just pray, God, that You'll be patient
with us, Lord.
We are a people of stubborn nature.
We are a people, Lord, who go our
own way.
We are a people, Lord, who after hearing
Your Word over and over again, seemingly, Lord,
fall back into the sin of our own
way and pride and arrogance.
And we pray, God, that You'll be merciful,
but yet firm, Lord.
And chasten us, Lord.
And correct us, Lord.
And scourge us that we might be partakers
of Your holiness, Lord.
We just look to You, Lord.
We look to Your sovereign Spirit who is
reigning in our midst here, revealing the things
of Christ to us.
We love You and praise You, Father.
In Jesus' mighty name.
I would invite you, if you would please,
to turn your Bibles to Luke 14.
I encourage you, if you didn't get the
tape last week, to get it.
I believe it's called An Invitation.
Gary's not here.
This is going to be part two.
Last week we received a clarion call from
the Holy Spirit.
A clarion call from the Holy Spirit who
is speaking this Word not only to us,
but He's speaking this Word throughout the entire
body of Christ.
Everywhere.
There is no exemption.
There is no place that is exempt.
Wherever there is the slightest resemblance of the
true candlestick, the true testimony of the Lord,
the true presence of the Lord, wherever there's
a gathering of believers, whether it is 200
or 2,000 or 22,000, it doesn't
matter.
Wherever there is the resemblance of a true
testimony of the Lord, the Holy Spirit has
been faithfully sent from God the Father.
And He's bringing this message as the true
servant of the Lord, the true servant of
God, the Holy Spirit is the faithful servant.
And He's bringing this message.
The banquet table is ready.
But time after time after time, when the
Holy Spirit knocks at our heart and we
sense, as we did this morning and as
we have been for many, many months and
we do when we're in our homes, we
sense the Lord speaking to us.
And whether we intentionally do it or not,
whether it is a conscious thing or not,
we find ourselves giving the Lord excuses as
to why we cannot accept His invitation to
follow Him, to receive His wealth, to lose
our life, to lose our way, to lose
our nature as Colette was talking about.
Oftentimes, our own device is our set ways.
We're so set.
And the Lord loves us so much, but
He must break us.
We must be broken vessels.
You remember the way Gideon won the battle.
Three hundred men.
Vessels of clay.
And inside those vessels of clay were candles.
And it wasn't until the vessels of clay
were broken that the brightness of the candle
shone forth and that was the way in
which God secured the victory for Gideon and
his army against the enemy.
And likewise, brothers and sisters, the Bible says
in Corinthians that we have this treasure in
earthen vessels.
There is a treasure if you belong to
Christ, if you are a believer.
Dear brother, dear sister, Christ lives in you.
Christ is with you.
But there's very little that the Lord can
get out of your life and out of
my life if my vessel, my outer vessel,
is hard and unbroken.
Because when people touch me, they're not going
to touch the treasure.
They're going to touch the vessel, the nature,
the attitudes, the strong opinions, the complaining spirit,
the human wisdom, the human judgment, the human
understanding, the nature.
And every one of us have peculiar things
in our nature that must be broken before
the fullness of the light of Christ can
have the liberty to shine forth and to
touch people.
And so we find that last week we
heard the call of the Spirit of God
telling us that a great supper has been
prepared.
That was chapter 14, verses 15 through 24.
And yet each one began to make excuses.
They began to make excuses.
They began to say, oh, could you excuse
me from this great supper?
Listen, brothers and sisters, can you imagine such
a thing?
Almighty God, the Creator of heaven and earth,
the One Who always was, had no beginning,
will never have an end.
Can you imagine the mystery of Almighty God
creating human beings like you and I and
then personally inviting us to a banquet, Norman,
a banquet, where He Himself is going to
feed us with heavenly food, with spiritual wealth
and treasures, and He has His servant the
Holy Spirit come and deposit these treasures into
our spirit and give us glimpses of the
wealth and the beauty and the fullness of
the life that is lived unto God?
Can you imagine?
Can you imagine how the Holy Spirit can
invite us to come and how we can
actually make an excuse?
Oh, the depths of sin.
The depths of the rebellion within the heart
of man.
The depths of our selfishness.
I mean, it's likely that none of us
would even think twice about rejecting an invitation
from a high dignitary to go out to
lunch.
We would probably be flattered.
We would probably be flattered and call some
of our friends and say, oh, guess who
invited me?
Guess who invited me?
So-and-so invited me to lunch.
And then us guys would tell our wives,
please, clean my clothes.
Could you iron that shirt?
Could you shine my shoes?
Oh, we wouldn't think twice of rejecting an
invitation from a dignitary.
But brothers and sisters, what about the invitation
from Almighty God that's going forth?
What are we doing with it?
That was last week.
Listen closely.
The whole topic of the Great Supper started
in verse 1 of chapter 14.
Last week was an invitation.
Beware of making excuses.
Now, we're going to look at verses 1
-14.
And we're going to see how...
Listen.
Listen carefully.
How to approach the banqueting table.
Brothers and sisters, there is a banqueting table
that is prepared for us.
Our Father in Heaven, whom Abraham was a
type of, is a wealthy man full of
treasure.
Spiritual wealth, spiritual treasure.
All the treasures are hid in Christ Jesus.
He wants to fill our lives with treasure.
Listen, He wants to wean the church from
a taste for this world.
And He wants to put in us a
taste for the spiritual world that's in Christ
Jesus.
He wants us to see that there is
no loss in losing everything for the sake
of following Christ.
He wants us to see that there is
no loss in losing our own life if
in fact we are gaining Him.
He wants to deliver us from that perspective
of perceiving that loss means sorrow.
And in order for Him to do this,
He brings a wonderful lesson here.
So I want us to listen carefully.
I want us to ask the Holy Spirit
to speak to us.
Brothers and sisters, ask the Holy Spirit to
speak to you.
If you have been invited by the Holy
Spirit, either today or you've been invited in
the past, and you know that God has
called you and has spoken to you time
and time again and is inviting you to
the banquet feast where your life becomes an
offering to God and where you are after
God, your heart is after Him, you desire
to find full satisfaction in Him alone.
You desire to forsake all the idols of
this world.
You desire to be free from anything that
would possess you.
Perhaps not outwardly being free from possessions.
That may or may not be a requirement.
But God help us if we ever tell
God that He can't do it.
Don't put your hand on anything God has
given you.
It's not yours.
Remember that.
The big problem in the body today is
the problem of ownership.
We have supposed that the things that we
have are ours.
They're not yours.
They belong to God.
What happened to the Word of God?
The Lord owns a cattle on a thousand
hills.
The Lord is the Creator of heaven and
earth.
The Lord owns the fullness of the earth.
There is nothing that you currently possess that
is actually yours.
But why do we hold as if it
is ours?
Because our minds need to be washed.
And so, maybe not outwardly, but brothers and
sisters, the call of the Spirit of God
to the Bride of Christ is this.
Nothing, nothing can possess you.
You may have possessions.
You may not have possessions.
You may have a lot.
You may have a little.
It ought not to matter to us.
What ought to matter is that our hearts
ought to be so broken before God that
we ought to say, Oh dear God, may
it be that nothing possesses me but a
love and a passion and a desire for
You and You alone.
Oh God, deliver this heart from grasping anything
of earth.
Because nothing can possess me but God.
We were created to be possessed by God
and to possess God alone.
That's why we were created.
That's why God created the church and placed
it on the earth so that the church
could demonstrate to the world what it is
to be a redeemed people in whom God
is the King.
And oh how we have fallen from this
testimony.
And now we want acceptance from the world.
We want approval from the world.
We want to act like the world.
We want to laugh at the things the
world laughs at when we ought to be
weeping.
We want the same entertainment as the world.
God delivers us out of the world that
we might be a peculiar people, a peculiar
treasure.
That we might show forth the praises of
Him who called us out of darkness into
His marvelous light.
God wants us to be a peculiar treasure
unto Himself.
But it's impossible.
It's impossible to be free from the entanglements
and allurements of the world if God is
not our satisfaction and pleasure.
And this is why in fact Christianity has
created a system of religion that enables the
believer to profess I've left the world and
then they get the whole world back in
their Christian life.
Same idols.
Same idols, but now it's a different name.
It's Christian now.
It's Christian.
Chapter 14.
How to come to the banquet table.
And it came to pass as He went
into the house of one of the chief
Pharisees to eat bread.
Now notice the phrase, eat bread.
Jesus is going to take this whole scenario
of eating bread in the house of a
Pharisee and He's going to do what He
does so many times.
He's going to take what He's doing and
He's going to bring it into another realm.
He's going to bring it into a spiritual
realm.
And that's what He's doing right now.
And the fullness of this is seen in
verse number 15.
And then Jesus takes it and runs with
it.
But watch now.
There's people eating bread on the Sabbath.
If we're going to sit at the table
that is spread before us and feast on
the Word of God, feast on the truth
that is in the Word of God that
the Holy Spirit can bring to us, if
we're going to enjoy love feasts one with
another, not carnal love feasts, but spiritual love
feasts, at which time we get together one
with another in homes and we wait on
the Lord and we let the Holy Spirit
reveal the treasure and the wealth and the
beauty of the Lord Jesus Christ one to
another.
Listen, listen.
I want to take a detour for a
second.
I want to take a detour.
Please listen.
We're going to go back here.
The Lord is grieved.
The Lord is very grieved as He looks
at the church because there's not a real
intense desire within the hearts of believers to
gather together one with another.
Now, we're not talking about a setting where
there's a religious agenda.
We're talking about the simple joy of making
time where you are before the Lord and
God knits your hearts to a few other
believers and you often gather together with anticipation
and expectation that as you gather together in
the name of the Lord, He will move
in your midst.
He will speak to you.
Words of encouragement.
Words of correction.
Words of instruction.
The whole reality of the joy and anticipation
of gathering together with a few like-minded
believers is fizzling out of the minds of
believers because they're too busy.
They're too busy.
They don't have time.
That's neglecting the house of God.
How is the house of God built up?
The house of God is built up as
Christ has communicated one to another through living
members.
We are all ministers.
Yes, there's different calls.
Are all apostles?
No.
Are all prophets?
No.
Are all pastor-teachers?
No.
But we're all ministers of the new covenant.
That is, we are vessels in whom the
ministry of life should be flowing.
Brothers and sisters, there is a blessing.
There is a blessing that comes that cannot
come any other way when believers have been
stirred by God and respond to God and
make time to gather with other believers.
Not talking about a religious gathering where there's
an agenda, where there's programs.
I'm talking about a pure, simple love feast.
Think about it.
You've got seven days in a week.
You've got seven nights.
Everyone's got a few hours at night where
they chill.
What do you do?
Play.
That's what most people do.
They play games.
And the house of God is neglected.
The house of God is neglected because we're
playing games.
Not concerned about the building of the house.
About imparting Christ to our brother and letting
what our brother or sister has impart his
life to us.
And the Lord's grieved.
So what do you do?
Do you make a law?
Do you legislate it?
Do you get together and say, all right,
now this is what we've got to do
now.
It won't work.
We've got to keep weeping and praying until
we wake up and see what we're missing.
Why do you think Paul says in Ephesians,
redeem the time?
What does it mean to redeem the time?
Buy it back.
The word redeem means to purchase.
Buy it back.
Listen, your time.
Everyone has been given the same amount of
time.
But you know what we as Christians need
to do?
We need to buy it back and give
it to the Lord.
We take our time and we use it
for who?
Ourself.
Listen, brothers and sisters, it's time to take
the pampers off.
It's time to take the bottle out of
the mouth.
It's time to grow up.
The house of God is lying in ruin.
And the answer is not for a charismatic
leader to arise and say, okay now, brothers
and sisters, this is the plan.
This is what we're going to do.
This is how we're going to build the
church and put a bunch of things together.
Now, I want some hands here.
Who's going to volunteer to do this and
that and get things moving?
That's not the answer in the heart of
the Lord.
The answer is for every individual member of
the body of Christ to recognize they are
called with responsibility before God.
You know what a true elder is in
the midst of the body of Christ?
Someone whose heart is broken because the house
of God lies in ruin.
Not somebody who has got a plan and
to try and sell their plan to people.
That's not what an elder is.
Someone who's got an agenda for the body
of Christ, that's not an elder.
Someone who wants your money, that's not an
elder.
An elder is someone who is broken because
they've touched the heart of Christ and they
see the house of God in ruin and
their heart is broken and they pray, Oh
God, Oh God, Oh God, help us together
to lay aside our own desires, our own
ways.
Help us to take the time we do
have and dedicate it to You and begin
to pray and travail so that there's ministry
within the body.
It becomes a priority.
A priority.
Listen, there's great lack in our life because
we never receive from anyone.
We're islands to ourselves.
See?
We're islands to ourselves.
Every home should be a church.
Every home should be experiencing body life.
Every home.
You don't have to have hundreds of people
over.
Just a few.
But you remember months and months ago there's
three words that come with this.
People are afraid of these words.
Accountability, transparency, and vulnerability.
See, that's what happens when you say yes
to the call of the Spirit.
Suddenly you become accountable to God.
Suddenly you become accountable to your brothers and
sisters.
Because if you know the Lord wants you
to gather on Tuesday and you have a
bad attitude, what are you going to do?
Say you had a fight with your wife.
But you know the brothers want to get
together on Tuesday.
What are you going to do?
Get in your car and take off?
That's why the house of God is in
ruin.
Don't have time.
See?
Vulnerability.
We have to become vulnerable.
And transparent.
We have to be transparent.
These are the qualities necessary in our heart
in order for the house of God to
be built.
What does it mean for the house of
God to be built?
Does it mean that numbers are added?
No.
No, it's not that at all.
It's not numerical.
The house of God is built as Christ
increases in our lives.
As the virtues and perfections of Jesus Christ
are more and more evident in our life
individually and as we come together.
That's the building of the house of God.
The building of the house of God.
Till we all what?
Ephesians 4, till we all what?
Come to the unity of faith, to the
knowledge of the Son of God, unto a
perfect man, a spiritual man.
Until we all come together to the place
where the full manhood of Jesus Christ is
being seen corporately through the body of Christ.
That's not going to happen through magic.
That's not going to just happen through osmosis.
Nor is it going to happen through charismatic
leaders taking captive groups of people and laying
out an agenda for their life.
And building kingdoms.
That's not how it's going to happen.
It's going to happen when all the stones
in the body realize their responsibility before God
and their calling.
And hear the call of God to take
up the cross and die to self.
And die to living lives like the world.
And being in love with Jesus and full
of the Holy Ghost.
And just pouring our lives out one for
another.
And the house of God is going to
be built then.
And true ministry.
Ministry.
The ministry called in the church to minister
to the church.
True ministry.
The ministry that builds up the church.
The apostolic ministry.
The prophetic ministry.
The pastor-teacher ministry.
True ministry.
Will never take captive the people of God.
They will never set an agenda for the
people of God.
But they will do nothing but what the
servant did.
Who was sent, Eliezer, from Abraham to find
Rebekah.
What did he do?
He spoke of nothing but Abraham.
And what did he give Rebekah?
Did he sit down with Rebekah and have
a little private conversation with her?
Hey, I want you to get to know
me.
I'm really a nice guy.
Hey, Rebekah, you've got beautiful eyes.
He didn't want himself to be seen or
heard.
All he did was give them the treasures
that belonged to who?
His master, Norman.
And a true ministry raised up by God
will give God's people nothing but the treasure
of Christ.
Plus nothing.
They will not build a kingdom for themselves.
They won't seek to create a codependent relationship.
They will hide behind the cross and faithfully
minister the Word of God and tell the
truth.
And the effects will be God's people will
become hungry for more of Jesus.
Hungry for God's Word.
That's the detour.
Now let's get back on.
He's at a Pharisee's house.
And behold, there was a certain man before
him which had dropsy.
He was paralyzed.
He was a paralytic.
And Jesus answering spoke unto the lawyers and
the Pharisees saying, Is it lawful to heal
on the Sabbath day?
And they held their peace.
And He took him and healed him and
let him go.
Listen carefully.
And answering them saying, Which of you shall
have a donkey or an ox fallen into
a pit and will not straightway pull him
out on the Sabbath day?
And they could not answer him again to
these things.
Now listen, Jesus is starting to address heart
issues.
He's eating bread.
And now what He's doing is He's teaching
them He's teaching them the requirements the heart
requirements necessary if we're to sit at the
banqueting table of the Lord.
Now examine yourself.
Examine yourself now.
Say, Lord, help me.
Because listen, brothers and sisters, you can get
an invitation to this banqueting table and we've
already learned what the banqueting table is.
It's feasting on Jesus and His Word.
It's being radical for Him.
Not lukewarm.
Not a casual Christian.
But radical.
A passionate lover for Christ.
First thing He deals with is the spirit
of Phariseeism and religion.
Phariseeism and religion.
Phariseeism and religion has to do with creating
rules and regulations that give the appearance that
one is holy or that one is close
to God.
But they are void of a true relationship
with God.
And they are contrary to the Word of
God.
I'll say that again.
If you're going to come to the banqueting
table and feast on the Word of God
and feast in the presence of Jesus Christ
and enjoy the love feasts that we ought
to be enjoying one with another on a
daily basis, the spirit of religion and Phariseeism
must be uprooted out of our life.
Following rules and regulations that give you the
appearance of being a holy spiritual person.
Any root of that is an enemy to
God and makes you unable to feast at
the banqueting table of the Lord.
The Lord doesn't entertain Pharisees.
The Lord's table has nothing for a Pharisaic
religious spirit.
What do you do to try to impress
your friends?
What do you do to try to impress
yourself, your husband, your wife, your children?
What goes on?
What kind of rules and regulations are you
following as substitutes for a passionate relationship with
Jesus Christ?
They're going to have to be put aside.
Because they will keep you from hearing the
Word of the Lord.
They'll keep you from fellowship and communion with
the Lord Jesus Christ.
Next, verse number 7.
And he put forth a parable to those
which were bidden.
See what he's doing here?
He's speaking parables now.
Listen, a parable is an earthly story communicating
heavenly truth.
Say that again.
A parable is an earthly story which communicates
heavenly truth.
Jesus is a master teacher, isn't He?
Now here's the second issue.
The first is the heart of a Pharisee
has to be taken out of us.
Secondly, He created a parable here when He
marked how they chose out the chief rooms,
saying unto them, When you are bidden to
a wedding, sit not down in the highest
room, lest a more honorable man than you
be bidden.
And he that bade thee and him come
and say to you, Give this man place.
And you begin with shame to take the
lowest room.
But when you are bidden, go and sit
down in the lowest room.
Does this sound like Rebecca?
Does this sound like Rebecca in the story
that Colette was sharing?
When Eleazar came and asked for a drink
of water, what did she say?
Oh sir, I not only will give you
water, but I'll water your camels.
I'll take the lower seat.
I'll serve you.
Brothers and sisters, Jesus here is emphatically speaking
to us.
And I pray that we have ears to
hear what the Holy Spirit is saying.
There will be none who will sit at
the banqueting table of Christ and feast on
His Word and feast in His presence or
feast at love feasts and know the joy
of being able to gather with other believers
and have the Lord move and have hearts
burn because the Lord is revealing Himself.
There will be none who will sit at
His table who have any hint of wanting
a higher place.
Any hint of wanting a higher place than
your brother or your sister.
Any hint of feeling that you're deserving of
something better than, something greater than a mere
servant.
Every husband here needs to realize that he
is a servant.
Every wife here is a servant.
Every teenager here is a servant.
We are called to be servants.
And Jesus had taken note, listen, He had
taken note how those who were invited to
the banquet were looking for what?
Places of importance.
Do you know why we get angry in
our real lives?
Come on, let's come back down where we
live.
Do you know why we get angry at
things?
Because the root of it is we feel
that we don't deserve what is happening.
The root of that is we're better than
this.
But servants aren't deserving of any rights.
This is where marriage problems come.
All the couples that I've ever talked to
over the years, and there's been quite many
of them, the root cause of all the
conflicts that have been communicated, sometimes resulting in
divorce, sometimes resulting in people living together because
they just can't accept the fact that divorce
is an alternative.
But they live together, but they're really not
together.
They just accept mutual existence one with another.
One does his thing, she does her thing,
and they try and avoid each other as
much as possible.
Some marriages are in that condition.
Christian marriages.
There's no healing.
There's no unity of spirit.
There's no passionate love.
And people say, why, why, why?
The root cause of this is because somebody
is in that marriage looking for a higher
place.
Someone is looking for a higher place.
Someone doesn't feel they deserve to be low.
Someone feels they don't deserve.
And that becomes a stumbling block.
When we feel that we deserve something better,
we get into conflict because we're asserting rights
then.
Rights.
And this is inherent within the human heart.
Without the grace of God, we get all
mad, don't we?
We get furious.
We can let loose the moment we begin
to see ourselves as something better than a
servant.
Is anybody hearing?
You want to sit at the banqueting table
and feast on the Lord Jesus Christ?
Do you want to know what it is
to have meaningful fellowship with other believers?
Know what it is to come together and
enjoy a love feast?
Know what it is to begin to experience
the input of other believers in your life?
Pray God deliver you from a Pharisee spirit.
Number two, pray that God deliver you from
pride, wanting to exalt yourself.
Listen, the fear of being vulnerable, transparent, or
accountable is rooted in what?
Pride.
I don't want pride to see the way
I really am.
Oh, so what I'm basically saying is I
want to wear a mask.
I want to be a hypocrite.
Is that what a hypocrite is?
An actor.
What's the root of that?
Pride.
I want to be something better than I
really am.
See, what I really am is a horrible
sinner apart from the grace of God.
And if I am a good man and
I am able to love my wife and
I am able to serve my brothers and
sisters, and it's above reproach, it's only because
the Lord's got a place in my life.
It's the Lord.
But if I step out from that place
of abiding and get cocky and haughty and
think for some reason now I've got it
together, watch out, watch out, I'm going to
fall as fast as I would if I
jumped off a building.
See?
So that's who I really am.
Are you trying to portray anything differently to
your brothers and sisters?
If so, I smell a Pharisee.
And Pharisees can't go to the table.
But you know what?
Pharisees have a really good religion.
Don't they?
Pharisees can put together a religion, Norman, and
it looks good.
But you know what it is?
An abomination to God.
Okay.
Verse 10.
But when you are bidden, go and sit
down in the lowest room.
Take what?
Take the place of a servant.
Now listen.
What is it that is the true test
to reveal what's in our heart?
Life.
What we're going through.
Just like Colette was saying.
It's not what you look like when you
come here.
Everyone's got on their best smile.
It's just the nature of a public gathering.
You know, I might be walking out the
door and Alan's walking.
I say, go ahead, brother.
Oh, that looks so good, doesn't it?
What am I doing at home?
Get out of my seat.
That's where I sit.
Get away from me.
So what about...
Oh, Alan, go ahead, brother.
What's that?
That's what it is.
It's phony.
It's being a phony.
Not that I couldn't be gracious to Alan.
But what it is, is I've let the
Lord...
See, this is something that I remember preaching
on years and years ago.
Selective crosses.
Remember that?
That brought a lot of trouble in our
life.
That word from the Lord.
Selective crosses.
We choose where we're going to let the
Lord establish His reign.
Certain areas of our life.
Then other areas of our life, the Lord
doesn't have any part.
We select.
Everybody wants the Lord to reign when they're
in public.
So they learn how to put on their
good smile.
They're gracious to their wife in public.
Oh, come on, sweetheart.
Then we're home.
What are you doing?
Get out of my face, you!
Usually it's the home where the Lord is
least welcome.
And you know why?
Because we bought into the lie.
Just like the Gentiles.
What is the home to the Gentile?
It's the place where they set up their
shrine, worship their gods, and they sit as
king.
But what should the home of the believer
be?
The church!
Thank you, brother!
It should be the church!
And who reigns in the church?
Who said Christ?
That's the right answer.
That's it.
See?
But you see how much we're like the
Gentiles.
It's my home.
I do my thing.
And that's why there's great lack.
Let me tell you, you'll never become the
person God wants you to be all by
your little lonesome self.
There's a place to seek the Lord.
There's a place to pray and set yourself
aside and hear God for yourself.
But the other side of the coin is
you need the input of the church in
your life.
Part of that is a gathering like this
where the Word of the Lord is preached
and taught.
This is an equipping time and it's essential
for the church.
But this is not all of it.
Equally, equally, equally we need the input of
our brothers and sisters on a daily basis.
And those who have set their homes up
as their castle very seldomly have the grace
in their life that comes when people become
vulnerable and transparent to other believers.
You could tell the difference.
Oh, they might hear God from time to
time.
Lone rangers.
They might have a degree of being spiritual
but there's a lack of grace in their
life.
It's a grace that can only come when
we open our homes and our hearts and
we go home and we cast out the
devil.
We cast out the kingdom mentality.
This is my house.
Bless God.
I do what I want in my house.
We teach our kids that horrible lie.
And then we wonder why from generation to
generation the lie of religion is passed down.
We wonder why.
Because we pass it down to our kids.
We wonder how many people want to buy
a home with the motive.
With the motive.
Oh, God.
That I might have a place where believers
can come and I can lay my life
down.
Or, we start out that way.
That's our motive to begin with and then
six months later, what happens?
It's gone.
Everything is different than what you planned.
You know, that's the scenario oftentimes with the
desire for home businesses.
I've talked to people over the years.
Oh, I can't stand going to work.
I don't have any time for the Lord.
Or I don't have any time for the
church.
If I can only work at home.
And they pray, oh God, oh God.
And the Lord gives them the desire.
And then what happens?
No time.
Less.
What's that?
They brought the work home.
That's the last thing you want to do,
right?
No, wait.
Can you hear this?
Do you understand the spirit of this?
This isn't law.
This isn't condemnation.
This is life.
Do you see?
Do you see what happens here?
See why we have to be careful?
Some of us here, some of us here
have wanted something.
And the Lord has given it to us.
And our original desire for it was commendable
in the eyes of the Lord.
But we've let it slip.
We've let it slip.
See?
So we have to be careful.
We have to guard against these things.
Okay, let's move on.
I hope we're hearing the Holy Spirit.
Very clear, very clear word from the Lord
these past several weeks.
The Lord is after us.
Number one, Phariseeism.
Relationship.
Religion without relationship.
Outward holiness.
God's against it.
And you'll not sit at His banqueting table.
This book will be a dead book to
you if you've got a heart of a
Pharisee.
Number two, the heart of an arrogant man
wanting to be something better than just a
mere servant.
You'll never sit at the table of the
Lord and feast from His Word.
You'll never enjoy real fellowship.
Alright, next.
Now, let's finish this off.
Verse 11.
Whoever exalts himself...
That word exalt is in the present tense.
That is, whoever keeps exalting himself.
Whoever lives a life demanding that they are
something better than a servant, you're going to
be humbled.
And don't think God can't do it.
God has a way of humbling, doesn't He?
He knows how to bring us down, doesn't
He?
Oh, He knows how.
If you don't think so, then you just
read the story of Nebuchadnezzar.
Huh?
He was a man...
Oh, look at the great kingdom God's given
me.
Look at what I've done.
And God humbled him for seven years.
He walked around like a dog.
He barked.
His fingernails grew a foot long.
And he lost his mind.
And really what God showed him was the
true nature of his wisdom.
That's his best right there.
That's what you and I are without the
grace of God.
Alright.
Number 12, 13, and 14.
This is a stumbling block in the body
of Christ.
And that's why there's a famine of the
true word of God.
There's a famine.
There's no love feast going on because of
this next section here.
Oh, Jesus is such a great teacher.
He's got such beautiful things in his word.
Then he said also to them that bade
him, When thou makest a dinner or a
supper, call not thy friends, nor thy brethren,
neither thy kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbors.
Now, the key is this next verse.
Listen.
Lest they also bid thee again and a
recompense be made to thee.
But when thou makest a feast, call the
poor, the lame, and the blind, and thou
shalt be blessed.
Here it is.
For they cannot reward thee.
Number three.
Oh, God, help us.
Motive in our service toward the Lord and
toward one other.
If the motive, listen carefully.
If the motive of our service is this.
I serve my brother and now he owes
me something.
We cannot come to the banqueting table of
the Lord.
That kind of service is not love.
Because love does not what?
Seek its own.
Love does not serve with the motive of
now you owe me.
Love pours out and out and out and
out with no desire for reward.
Again, every single marriage that can get a
hold of this would be healed of all
the horrible things that go on in marriages.
Why are there so many problems in marriages?
Because we can't serve selflessly.
There's got to be this idea of you
owe me this.
You owe me this.
How about the body of Christ?
So many broken relationships.
Why are there so many broken relationships in
the body of Christ?
Because when we seek to reach out to
someone, we feel that they're in debt to
us.
And if they don't recompense, if they don't
reward us, if they don't somehow acknowledge or
do something nice for us, we get mad.
We close our heart to them.
And there's a breach.
Why?
Because our motive has to be cleansed.
Ask yourself this question as we begin to
close.
Ask yourself this question.
Where has the Lord shown you that your
service toward him or your service toward someone
else is connected to a motive in your
heart where you expect some kind of a
reward?
Well, guess what?
As long as that is there, you're going
to find it hard to come to the
banqueting table of the Lord.
Verse 14, the latter part.
When we get to the place where God
cleanses our motive, and we can serve him
and one another without expecting to be repaid,
here's what our hopes are set on then.
For thou shalt be rewarded at the resurrection
of the just.
There's our reward, brothers and sisters.
The resurrection of the just.
Let's bow our hearts if we could, please.
Father, we thank you for the table that
you have spread before us.
We thank you for calling us.
We thank you, Lord, for making us see
so clearly that you have great treasures and
wealth for us in your Son.
And now, Lord, we pray that you will
very firmly and lovingly deal with us and
free us from all these things that hinder
us from coming to your banquet.
Free us from the Pharisee spirit.
Free us from pride and thinking that we're
deserving of something more than just being a
servant.
And free us, O God, from the motive
of wanting a reward for what we do
on earth.
God, please keep us from making excuses.
Excuses, excuses, excuses.
Help us to surrender our life to you
today and be changed by your power.
Okay, the healing of the Lord is present.
As we sing this one song, I want
to just make an invitation.
Anyone here, you've heard the Lord.
He has spoken to you.
And you want Him to touch you and
heal you and do something in your life
that only He can do.
I want to invite you right now in
your seat to simply cry out to Him
and say, Jesus, here I am.
Do the work that you must do.
If you want special prayer, come forward and
we'll get together and pray with you as
we sing this song.
Father, we look to You today.
Do the work in our hearts.
Thank You for Your Holy Spirit.
I pray, Lord, for every person here who
in their heart, just now, in the privacy
of their own heart, Lord, they cried out
to You and they said, Lord, You've spoken
to me through Your Word and I need
help.
I pray for those people today, Lord, by
the power of the Holy Spirit and the
name of Jesus, You would create faith in
their heart.
Enable them to believe that You have heard
their cry and that You will answer their
prayer in Your timing.
Help them, Lord, not to get discouraged or
give up.
Help them, Lord, not to become despondent, but
to patiently wait for Your timing.
That You'll make all things new.
That the winter months in the Spirit will
pass and the day of spring will come
and the sound of birds will be heard
once again and the smell of the beautiful
spring flowers will once again flood your life.
It will happen.
Just be patient and wait.
God will do it.
He loves you with an everlasting love.
He said, I'll never leave you.
I'll never forsake you.
Lo, I am with you always, even to
the end of the age.
That's what He's saying to someone here today.
And He loves you.
God bless you.
We have to move on.
Unfortunately, we're under time constraint, but God be
with you.
God bless you.
And let's lay hold of what the Lord
is doing and believe Him to do it.
Jesus' love.
Amen.
Oh, Lord, I
receive.
Receive.
Beautiful.