It’s always a good time to be in church. Maybe you came to church so that when you left church, you would feel good that God had touched you. I pray that happens because it’s important that you feel and experience the touch of God because there is only one God in the universe that can actually touch you and He is the living God.
Live in the moment with God. It is my desire that what God has given me today, to speak to you will bring a moment to you that you will live in this moment, and God will bring something to you, that you can say; God was here today in this moment and He has changed me in this moment.
God is truth;There are many things going on in the world around us and whatever you may you experience, is not a truth, it’s just an experience. Truth is something that comes because God is in that moment. You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. Truth is not what you know, Truth is Who you know because Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life. So you can’t speak about truth in terms of concepts. You speak of truth in terms of Persons. Jesus, Holy Spirit and the Father; three Persons are truth. Truth is not a concept, Truth is a Person, whatever the living energy of the Godhead is, that is truth.
Truth is embodied in the Godhead. The Godhead started everything, They created the framework and the foundation of everything. If they started everything, then everything that comes from Them is truth. And everything that is not of Them is not truth. It doesn’t matter what people say or think. Only what happens in God is true. So when I’m looking for something in my walk of life, in humanity, in a moment, in school, in church, in business, in every situation, I need God in that moment to be with me. When God is with me in the moment then in that moment, I can have His truth. That truth sets me free from anything that the world has started to create around me.
10Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in Me? (John 14:10 AMPC) What I am telling you I do not say on My own authority and of My own accord; but the Father Who lives continually in Me does the (His) works (His own miracles, deeds of power) (John 14:10 AMPC). So the Father is doing it in and through Jesus. Right? Every moment Jesus opens His mouth, lays His hands is a moment, that’s the next moment with God. It’s not the last moment, it’s this moment.
11Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me; or else believe Me for the sake of the [very] works themselves. [If you cannot trust Me, at least let these works that I do in My Father’s name convince you.] 12I assure you, most solemnly I tell you, if anyone steadfastly believes in Me, he will himself be able to do the things that I do (John 14:11-12 AMPC). What? If anybody steadfastly believes in Me, he will be able to do the thing that I do. That means you and me – where? Anywhere. When? When He’s in the moment. Not because you learned something in Bible school, not because you have a knowledge base of something. Unless you have those moments with God then actually, you become clouded with the fog of all those other things that begin to matter more than being in the moment with God.
12He will himself be able to do the things that I do; and he will do even greater things than these, because I go to the Father. 13And I will do [I Myself will grant] whatever you ask in My Name [as presenting all that I Am], so that the Father may be glorified and extolled in (through) the Son (John 14:12-13 AMPC). This is a very powerful passage of scripture. It means anybody can do this. It is my heart’s desire that you have your own encounters with God. That you will do whatever God tells you to.
Jesus4got up from supper, took off His garments, and taking a [servant’s] towel, He fastened it around His waist. 5Then He poured water into the washbasin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the [servant’s] towel with which He was girded. 6When He came to Simon Peter – Lord, are my feet to be washed by You? [Is it for You to wash my feet?] (John 13:4-6 AMPC). What has happened here? Jesus just washed all the disciples’ feet. If you look at it in the natural, this is the perfect power play for Peter to become the head disciple once and for all. Because Jesus already washed all the other disciples’ feet. “I’m bold enough and I’m close enough to You to ask the question. No one else would ask the question, but I’ll ask the question. So even if I get the answer wrong, and it’s all wrong, at least I asked the question that puts me number one”. Motive about to be exposed.
Truth is much greater than political agenda: 7Jesus said to him, You do not understand now what I am doing, but you will understand later on (John 13:7 AMPC). He didn’t have to tell that to the other disciples. So, Peter, you think you can ask the question? I’m going to give you the answer. It’ll put you in your place and you’re the only one that I have to say; you’ll have to understand this later.” People think they can bring politics into church life. They bring self-interest, self-aggrandizement issues into church life. If you live with God in the moment, He resolves them like that. Some people stay in your life, other people leave your life, other people just stay on the periphery because God can’t allow a pure spirit, a pure walk with God to be undermined by a political agenda. Truth is much greater than a political agenda. There is no political agenda in church that can undermine a spiritual man who walks in truth. A spiritual man will thrive and flourish because he’s spiritual. God will take care of him.
8Peter said to Him, You shall never wash my feet! Jesus answered him, Unless I wash you, you have no part with (in) Me [you have no share in companionship with Me] (John 13:8 AMPC). Peter is making a real, a real bold statement here. He’s actually trying to say, “You’re the Master, and I’m the teacher, I must wash your feet.” Jesus is saying, “There is something you don’t understand here and I told you, you’ll understand it later, but because you’re pushing the subject, this is a dividing point. You could have just stopped at; I’ll understand later. But because you push the subject of how important you think you are, if you don’t do this, we are separating ways, Peter. I don’t care what the Father revealed to you about who I am as Christ, the Son of the living God. If you don’t let me wash your feet, we have no companionship, we have no fellowship, we have nothing.
Don’t address spiritual things with a natural response: 9Simon Peter said to Him, Lord, [wash] not only my feet, but my hands and my head too! (John 13:9 AMPC). So now the Lord has to correct him again but at least he’s headed in the right direction this time. When you begin to address spiritual things with a natural response, you’re going to get it wrong every time. Thank God Peter had a heart that could get it right. If you address spiritual things with natural things, you’ll get it wrong every time. 10Jesus said to him, Anyone who has bathed, needs only to wash his feet, but is clean all over. And you [My disciples] are clean, but not all of you (John 13:10 AMPC).
What does Jesus say? You can’t have fellowship with me unless you let Me wash your feet. This is God of the universe, He is the One who makes a statement; the Father is in Me and I am in Him and I’ve done everything that the Father has told Me to do, it’s not My authority, it’s God’s authority. And He comes into this whole feet washing thing as a servant. He’s not coming to exercise His authority with you. He is coming to serve. So Peter says but there is no authority in serving. You understand what Peter was saying? This thing with what I know in the world, with the Romans, the occupation of Rome and everything; there is no authority in serving. A servant is a nothing. Only when you’re a big man, a teacher, someone who’s important, are you worth something. Jesus says, “You don’t understand. You don’t understand the authority of serving, then you can’t have authority in anything.”
What do Pastor Sharon and I do? I’ll tell you what, the Lord has been really speaking to me about many things that He wants to accomplish in our ministry because all of the political things that I’ve spoken about has indeed happened in our church a number of times. We’ve had to go through a period of waiting, growing, restoring, strengthening. But something that we’ve learnt out of all of this time is that the authority that we carry is not based on how much money comes into the ministry. We have learnt that the authority that we carry is not by how many big buildings we can build or how quickly I can be on television or anything that you might actually want to measure success by.
The authority that we carry is to bring life; Pastor Sharon and I have learnt that the authority that we carry is to bring you life and to live the life that God places in us in the moment, every day with each other, with you. That’s our authority. We wash your feet every day. Many of you have been with us a long time. You know that everything that we do is because of our faith. It’s not because of what you have done.
Pastor Sharon and I have reached a stage in our life now where we do not take a salary out of this ministry. We have not been taking any salary out of this ministry for almost two years. That’s not because we shouldn’t, it’s because we are sowing a seed every month back into the ministry because we can live without it with our faith. We have been living in our faith for two years without taking money out of this ministry for income to live with. I’ve been believing to do this for 30 years because I heard Kenneth Copeland say a long time ago, he was up to 90% and he was believing God that he would be able to live on 0%, he would give 100% of his money away. And I said that’s the mark I’m aiming for. So Pastor Sharon and I have hit that mark and we’ve been living that mark for some years now where we don’t take a cent out of the church – it stays in the ministry.
Read (John 13:13-17 AMPC) So just let me say this; the spiritual gift of God that rests upon me and my calling is of such a nature that many times I can look at people’s lives and I can see in the spirit what’s going on, where things are not happening and where things are happening. I would actually not be spiritual if I didn’t see these things. But it is not my business to speak about them unless the Lord tells me to. Why not? Because sometimes people are not ready to hear. Sometimes I have to speak when they are ready to hear them.
21Jesus said to him, “If you really want to be perfect, go immediately and sell everything you own. Give all your money to the poor and your treasure will be transferred into heaven. Then come back and follow me for the rest of your life.” (Matthew 13:21 TPT). In other words, this gift on you that’s making money is subservient to the gift of God’s immediate calling in the moment. This man is a very faithful, loyal believer. He comes and he has an encounter with Jesus and Jesus says to him, “This gift of making money that you have, you say, you’ve done everything you can to actually be a covenant man. Okay, take all this money that you’ve made from the gift that I gave you, take it, sell it, give it to the poor, and your wealth will be transferred to heaven, and come follow Me.” Which gifting, which calling was most important? In the moment God said; I’m changing what you were ordered originally to do and I’m calling you to do something that is completely different. You see, only in moments like that, can you have these encounters with God.
READ: (Matthew 13:22-27 TPT) Peter has all these questions; “You can’t tell me this when I’ve given up everything. You can’t tell me this when I’ve done that and You can’t do that to me and I’ve got to do this to You. What’s with Peter? And even with Peter, God’s got mercy and grace. It’s a wonderful thing. What’s in it for me? I guess most of us Christians come to God with; what’s in it for us? God says, “Okay, I know, I understand where you come from. I’ll answer your question.
28Jesus responded, “Listen to the truth: In the age of the restoration of all things, when the Son of Man sits on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will have twelve thrones of your own, and you will govern the twelve tribes of Israel. 29For anyone who has left behind their home and property, leaving family—brothers or sisters, mothers or fathers, or children—for my sake, they will be repaid a hundred times over and will inherit eternal life. 30But many who push themselves to be first will find themselves last. And those who are willing to be last will find themselves to be first.” (Matthew 13:28-30 TPT).
God is speaking to us church, “I will take the children.” If we as parents say we must push our children to be first, they could very well end up finding themselves last. But if we allow them to come in the moments of God, and they decide that they want to put God first, then He has the power, He has the authority to transfer into their lives moments with Him, glorious moments of encounters with Him that don’t just change this thing of whether they should go here or there or go to this place or that place. But their encounter establishes them on a foundation of truth in the moments of God that when they enter into wherever God chooses to show them will flow in the future of their lives. He is always with them every moment and never will they be the ones to push themselves into first place. They will always take the last place and God will put them in first place.
This is a moment where God is talking to you like Peter. “You don’t let Me wash your feet, we have no fellowship here. We can’t be part of each other.” You know, the way that the Rabbi’s teach tithing, Malachai 3:10; I will open up the windows of heaven. And I will pour out a blessing upon you, that there is not room enough to contain it – comes on the back of God saying, “your words have been against Me, so therefore I’m against you. But now bring your tithing to My storehouse, and watch if I will open up the windows of heaven and pour out blessing upon you that you cannot contain.” That blessing is not just money. That blessing is all of your life. There is another passage of scripture where there’s an argument going on between the disciples, and they’re having a conversation, “Who’s going to be the first and who’s going to be the greatest and who’s going to sit on Jesus’s right hand and who’s going to sit on His left hand.” Jesus answers, “It’s not about that. It’s about what we do and serve.”
The Rabbi’s teach and interpret that scripture of opening up the windows of heaven and pouring out blessing that they cannot have room enough to contain it – it’s like if it starts to rain and you went out in the rain. Let it make you wet. Put on some tekkies with socks in them and just go walk in the rain and stand there for half an hour while it’s bucketing. And you get so wet that nothing is dry on your clothes, and it’s just soaking your bones. Right? When it’s into your shoes and your socks you go; shloesh, shloesh. It doesn’t matter whether you’re walking through puddles or if you’re walking anywhere, you’re just wet. You don’t even want to take a towel to try and dry yourself down because there’s no point.
Jesus talks about this when He says; I’ll open up the windows of heaven and pour out blessings upon you that there is not room enough to contain it. He says, “Go walk in the rain, child because it’s just going to keep raining and raining and raining upon you; My favour, My blessing, My riches, My wealth, My health, My divine connections, My favour, My opportunities, things that just no one else can make happen just keep happening, keep happening. It just keeps pouring upon you. And this has got nothing to do with how good you are, how much you’ve got to repent from, how bad you’ve been. God’s grace is so great that it doesn’t matter what you even did yesterday. If you just say, “Sorry, Lord,” carry on and let it keep on raining. Because it’s about the condition of your heart – I want Him, I want to be in Him, I want to be with Him. You can’t be perfect, you can’t save yourself. But with God, it’s possible.
Your walk with God; The Lord wants me to do this, this morning; I want to be clear that this is not about your future decisions. This is about a walk for God. So, there are some things that God wants me to do and I’m doing this here because I’m being honourable and respectful. (Pastor John calls some of the young people out of the congregation). I’m going to be obedient to God, what God told me to do today. This is the day you can look back on for the rest of your life, you can look back at this day and say that this day I chose Jesus. Doesn’t matter what you do, doesn’t matter where you go – this day I chose Jesus.
You know what happens when you choose Jesus yourself? You’re saying all of you, I choose to be last so that He can make me first. You’re about to start your life and there are a lot of things that God wants to do in you and through you and for you.
Pastor Lynn stands as an intercessor today for the adult children. We ask You, Father, to encounter them. Send angels to sit on the edge of their bed, send angels to meet them in a subway somewhere, somewhere where they will know they’ve encountered Jesus, the Most High God. Bring them into that space of encountering You, Father, in Jesus’ name. Praise the Lord.
I am the Pastor of the children, I want to say to the adults and the parents here; God had me speak to the children because He’s taking the children. I want to just make the statement so that you know, I am the pastor of the children, even though you may be parents of the children. There’s a big difference; if they’re in this church, I am their spiritual shepherd, their leader. So the Lord has instructed me to do this today. He is saying; “I will take the children”
I had an encounter with God when I was 32 years old. I was earning a lot of money in the corporate world, I was a senior executive and had a lot of influence. But God chose my move and He said, “I called you from the foundation of the earth and so I’m telling you, your time in the corporate world is over. It’s time to come follow me, son. So I said, “I’m ready, Lord.” So then, you know the story, Pastor Sharon and I, we’ve got to serve Kenneth and Gloria Copeland and Creflo Dollar and Jerry Savelle and Jesse Duplantis. We were taking care of them for 10 days while they were in South Africa. When I’m in there, the Lord says, “You are connected to Jerry Savelle.” I couldn’t wait a week to make up my mind. When the Lord put that in me and He said, “Now’s the time,” I couldn’t wait a week. If I had waited a week I would have missed God. But the very next morning, I went in front of Brother Jerry and I said, “Brother Jerry, I believe that our lives are connected.” The rest is history; 24 years later we are still connected. Praise Jesus.
Use this moment. Today is a day – I don’t care what you do with today, but today is a whole day. There are 24 hours in this day. But if you go into the afternoon and you keep doing things and you forget about what’s happened now, you may never come back to this moment. I’m saying use this moment. Say, “I’m here, Lord. I’m making a choice for You.”
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