Scripture reference: 2 Peter 2:18-22 (NKJV); 2 Peter 3:1-17 (NKJV); Matt 6:9-10 (NKJV); Matthew 24:1-8 (NKJV) Matthew 24:4-5 (NKJV)
Pastor Sharon Bendixen:
Father, now, now it’s time to receive Your Word, Lord. Oh, thank You, Father, for Your ever living Word that comes to us today with Your living voice, Lord, comes to us through the earthen vessel of Pastor John, Father. Thank You, Father, that He only says this morning what he hears You’re saying. He does this morning what he sees You’re doing and he hears You’re saying, Lord. He opens his mouth and You fill it, Father, You fill it. Bread, Lord, You are the living Bread. We receive living Bread. All of God’s children love living, living Bread. We love the living bread, the living voice of the living God that comes to our hearts and falls on our hearts today. The ears, our ears of our heart, the eyes of our heart, we hear. Blessed are our eyes for they see this morning. Blessed are our ears for they hear, Father. Thank You, thank You for the sharp sword that comes through Pastor John this morning. It comes as a sword, it comes as water. It comes, Father, in every which way that Your Word comes to us, Father. We receive it in the mighty name of Jesus. We all say; Amen. Glory, glory. Praise You.
Pastor John Bendixen:
Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. Glory to Jesus. It’s good to be in the house of the Lord today. Hallelujah. Are you glad to be here? [Congregation answers; yes] Me too. You’re all looking good. Praise Jesus. Yeah. I have to stand for about an hour. I think I’ll make you stand with me today. No? Then you can’t listen so well because you listen from your bum. You may be seated. Praise the Lord. Well, I know, when at first I started cycling and I had days in the saddle, then I would sometimes come to church and I wouldn’t be able to know how to sit in church even for half an hour because it was challenging. But praise the Lord the longer you cycle the less that becomes a problem. So in that kind of mindset I should have you sitting in church for many more hours and then you’ll get used to it and then you won’t mind your numb backside any longer. You’ll just get used to it. You don’t seem to be buying this story this morning. Well, praise the Lord.
If you have an invasion of your home, if you know there is an invasion happening in your house, what will you do to prevent it? Well, as we go about our daily lives here in Africa, we live between knowing that there is a strong possibility that at some point in time someone might want to come and invade your home. So, this has been something that’s a common occurrence. It’s called reappropriation of goods and services from people who have to those who do not have or tell you they don’t have anyway. But so, what do we do? I mean, not just even people living in the townships, what do they do? They do the best that they can to make their house free from invasion. Right? You put burglar bars on if you can. Some people will have an alarm system, some people will have access to security details that might come based on a panic button or an alarm going off. People do whatever they can to prevent invasion. If you’re in townships, you probably have people that live around you that if they hear you scream, or shout, or whatever the case might be, that they will come to your aid. And often there is township retribution for people who do such a thing. They find out who’s been stealing or who’s been doing that kind of thing and then they do township justice. They do. Yeah, they take sjamboks, or whatever it is, and they find out who the culprits are, they take a whip to them. They teach them a lesson. Certainly, in more rural townships, they do that. Well, because invasion is a violation of rules. Invasion.
Now that’s just on a one on one basis. More often than not, when people invade your home, they will target your home, and no one else around you. But then maybe a year later, or two years later, they will come to the person next to you. Sometimes they don’t invade your home, sometimes they invade your motorcar. And they break a window or they somehow try and open it and they will take whatever’s in your car. It’s an unlawful entry. Right? Well, what about an invasion of the nation? What if we knew today, that on Friday, our country was going to be invaded by a superpower, who you could do nothing to stop because you just don’t have enough firepower to stand against this invasion. You don’t have enough people, you don’t have the technology, you don’t have whatever it takes, you don’t have what it takes to stop the invasion. What do you do then? Do you just sort of wait for the inevitable and surrender? What do you do?
Well, you know, Africa is littered with stories of invasions. From as early as history goes back, there are people that have invaded the continent of Africa, from the French, to the Portuguese, to the British, to the Dutch, to many other nations have come onto the soil of Africa. They have come and invaded by force the continent of Africa. There are invasions that are happening even in our modern day right now. The Russians are invading Ukraine, or they’re attempting to anyway. This is an unlawful, unlawful position where you take an overwhelming force or you use surprise, or you use something that you can use to your advantage and your benefit to go in and occupy a place for a short time or for a long period of time. Take something that you want and then leave with it or remain there permanently and live and make that your house. So, if this was going to happen to you, and you knew it was going to happen to you, you would probably do one of two things. You would probably do everything you could to prevent the invasion. Right? I mean, everything that you could you would do to prevent it. If you didn’t know that you could prevent it, you would probably say, “Well, what are the risks if I remain in the place while it’s being invaded?” And you will assess the risk and you might say, “Well, the risk is that I could really get hurt if this is dangerous to me because obviously, someone’s coming with an unlawful, illegal entry coming into my space.”
So you would assess whether there is any benefit for us to stay there. The answer is probably not. The best thing is, once you’ve assessed that you will probably leave it to them, let them have what they like. And if they leave quickly, you can go back and reoccupy. If they stay there, well, then you might just have to find another place to stay, or go to a higher force, a higher law or a higher power and ask them to come and help you against the power that has occupied your home. If it had to be on a national level, and we couldn’t stand against a superpower, we might go to an equal opposing superpower, and ask them and make an alliance with them, and ask them to come and help us. Either way, we would assess a risk, we would assess our own capability to defend ourselves against the risk. And then we would do something about it, whether it be to put up a white flag, whether it be to leave, or whether it be to go make an alliance with someone else, or some other power.
Well, if you don’t know, if you don’t know that someone’s coming to occupy your space, whether it’s temporary, or permanently, if you don’t know, and you are unaware of that event occurring, then you don’t have time to assess the risk. You don’t have time to react. And so then you have to just in a moment make a decision of what your reaction is going to be. Right?
Praise the Lord. We have a lot of things going for us as Christians. But I want to use this example to highlight to you that we are right at this moment in time, you, you personally are being invaded. You personally are being invaded. But you might say, “Pastor John, I’m not being invaded because if I knew I was being invaded, I would do something about it.” Well, if you really think about people who can invade a home, they would wait until you’re asleep or you’re away. So you’re either away or you’re asleep. If you’re not going to be away and they really want to invade your home, they’ll wait until you’re asleep. As quietly as possible they’ll come into your home and they will take what they want and leave. You wake up in the morning and you find out, hey, my TV’s gone, my hi-fi is gone, cell phones are gone, my laptop’s gone, my computers are gone – whatever it is that they decide they want to take. They take the stuff and they leave and you don’t even know about it. Then you make this assessment. “Well, that’s all insured, or it’s replaceable. Me and my family, we’re okay.”
On that basis, you say, “I’ve been invaded but thank God we’re okay.” So your cost benefit evaluation is, “My life is intact, who cares about the stuff?” Right? But you didn’t know the invasion was going to happen. You only can react to the event afterwards. You can only make a decision after the thing has been taken from you. And then you might evaluate and you might look at the windows or you might look at the doors and you might try and find a way of how they got into your home. You might say, “Well, I must do something about this. I must try and make this space more secure.” I know of people that this has happened to and for weeks and months, and sometimes years, they don’t sleep at night because they hear sounds and the sounds wake them up and they think they’re being invaded again. So you think that I might be using the word invaded rather dramatically this morning. But in the truest sense of the word you are being invaded.
Your space is being occupied by force that you do not permit or give permission to. Right? Well, so you think, but the very mere fact that you exist, that you have goods, that you have a home, and there are people that are roaming around that want to have those same goods, say that they want to relieve you of those goods that you have and make it theirs. So, you are being invaded? What have you got, and who’s invading you?
Well, here’s what you’ve got, you’ve got the freedom of choice. That’s a very powerful thing. You have the power of choice. There is no other being than a human being. There are no other beings than human beings that have the same power. Animals don’t have the power of choice that you have. Spirit beings, angels, and devils don’t have the power of choice. They do what they do, because they have already chosen. And so, because they chose, God removed the choice away from them. Yeah. So even now, the angels in heaven that fly around the throne, the angels on the earth, they’re here to serve you and me. They don’t have a choice whether to serve us or not, by the very fact that they come from the presence of God, they do the will of God. They are activated by our choice, and our words, angels are.
When your angel hears you speak and say things like, “I thank You, Jesus, I praise You, Jesus, I glorify Your name. I thank You that all my needs are met according to Your riches in glory. I thank You that Your Word says that I’m blessed going in and going out and coming in and that all good things you have provided for me.” When they hear words like that, and they hear you speaking the Word of God, they must act on it. They don’t have a choice. They must act on it. This is good news. Because they are sent to act on your choice, on your words. Demonic forces have the same thing. They live in darkness. And they are activated by your words, by your choice.
So when you say… you know, I hear people from time to time say words like this. They have no clue what they’re doing. But they say words like this, “Sjoe, that situation – it half scared me to death.” You know. Brother Jerry has a very powerful testimony of this. I listen to him as frequently as I’m prompted to, and sometimes I just make a choice of my own will to listen to him, because he’s my spiritual leader. I want to hear what God’s saying to him. But he has a very powerful choice, a very powerful testimony of his grandfather, that he used to go and visit on the farm. And when he was at school in high school, he would go and visit his grandpa on the farm. And his grandfather would say, “Well, Jerry, I want to stay alive just long enough to see you graduate from college.” And every time he would go and see his grandpa, his grandfather, his grandfather was saying, “Well, Jerry, I want to live long enough just to see you graduate from college.”
He wasn’t actually speaking words of death per se. But he was speaking his future out of his mouth. And what happened is Brother Jerry graduated from college and six months after he graduated from college, his grandfather died. Why? Because for all of his life, he had been saying,” I just want to see you graduate from college. And then, that’s good enough for my life.” So, he died when he was too young. How come he died? Because there were spiritual forces that were hearing his words, all of his life.
We are in a situation where demonic forces have to react to the words that you speak. They can’t react even to your thoughts, you know, which gives us a lot of hope, because you can have doubts in your mind but speak words of God out of your mouth. And they don’t know that you’re having doubtful thoughts. They might be planting doubtful thoughts in your mind. But when you speak the words of God, they can’t act on your thoughts, they have to act on your words. Now, if you think long enough about words, then those words will eventually come out of your mouth. That’s what meditation on the Word is all about. You meditate on the Word, then those words come out of your mouth. When they come out of your mouth, angels must hear. The Holy Spirit rests upon it. And between the Holy Spirit who acts on behalf of the Father and Jesus on the earth, He works in conjunction with angels to make happen what you speak.
Well, the same thing happens with dark forces. They watch you act. If you act, it’s the same as if you speak. If you go and do bad actions, and you start stealing stuff and doing stuff, you may not say I’m going to steal, or this is stolen, but your actions are already a manifestation of what’s in your heart. Yeah. So, your actions have a lot to do with, have a lot to do with what is happening in your life.
If you knew that you were being invaded, you would say, “No Pastor John, I am not, I’m not being invaded.” Well. If you live in perception, instead of truth, you will open yourself to deception. That’s what I’ve been saying. If you live in deception, in perception, instead of truth, you open yourself to deception. See, perception is something that you’re thinking about, that you’re influenced by. And if you live in perception, rather than truth, you will live and open yourself to deception. The only way out of deception is correction. The Bible says if you know the truth, the truth will set you free. Rejection of correction will enforce your perception as the highest form of self-believing truth. So, what is the truth that you live by? What is your truth? What is your truth? So, your truth that you think you’re living by truth, might be the most basic form of real that you can be.
You know, if you are a South African, you would rightly consider that most, the majority of South African culture, both all colours, has a fair amount of honesty in which they live with each other. Let’s call it real. There’s not a lot of faking circumstances and faking the way that we live life. It’s fairly real. And so, your truth might be – how real can I live life? How do you measure your realness? How do you measure your realness? Whose standard do you use to measure realness? The majority of us use the standard of realness that we use is determined by the culture that you live in. The people that you talk to, the community you connect with.
Hello everybody. Good morning to you. Are you all with me? Good.
So, if you’re living in realness then you have this kind of foundation in your life that says,” I don’t want to live in dishonesty. I don’t want to be a fake person. I don’t want to be a person who lives in a fabricated image. I want to live, what you see is what you get.” Come on. By and large, as South Africans, we tend to live this way. Much of that is determined by our community that we live in, no matter what the colour of your skin, much of it is determined by the community that you live in. We tend to live a very open social life in South Africa. In America, it’s very different. If you move out of churches, and even within churches in America, it’s very different. Because in America, people tend to live in isolated cubicles of their houses, and their job function that they live in. And then they choose which social circles that they want to be part of. And so, they can present an image of what they want you to believe about themselves.
It is very rare, I mean, there are some states in America where this is much more… The way we are in South Africa is more similar in some states, like for example, if you go to Montana, you go to the Dakotas, if you go to Oklahoma, some states like that, you will find that there is a more openness in people. And they might even invite you into their homes. And the large percentage of those people are Christians, in one form or another. But if you go to the big cities, and you go to the big states, and you go to the big economic areas of the United States, you will find that people very seldom invite you to their home. If you’re going to have anybody socially gathering, you will be invited to a restaurant, or a place to have coffee or a meal or a hotel or someplace and you will meet somewhere, an office or something. You’ll meet somewhere, you will have a meeting. If it’s a social thing, you’ll meet away from your house, very few people actually will let you into their house. It’s not a common thing in America.
So, you can present yourself to be whatever you want people to think that you are. One of my minister friends from California, who came and ministered in our church a couple of times, you know, he used these words – people use rounded words to leave you with an impression of what they are saying to you, making you think that you are hearing one thing but knowing that you are hearing something else. He calls it rounded words. In other words, they’re smooth. They are carefully thought out, presented to actually say to you, “No, but I talked to you about this. But actually, my intent and my meaning is different to what I actually said to you. What I’m actually going to do is different to what I’m making you believe I’m doing.” Rounded words.
People that are in sales and marketing are much better at doing that than people that are for example, in accounting, or in other kinds of services and things. You will find that there are some people that know how to use words, other people don’t know how to use words as easily. What am I talking about? I’m talking about people that create perceptions. Perception is something that often or not has a measure of deception. I’m presenting you the best version of myself. But I’m not telling you all the other stuff I don’t want you to know. I just want you to know the best version of myself. The only way for deception to be removed out of your life is to be corrected. The only thing that can correct you is real truth, not perceived truth.
Here’s the problem – when you speak words that create perceptions that are contrary to what is really going on, is when you live that way, you think everybody else lives that way. You do, because you yourself have become good at living that way. And so, because you become good at living that way, you think everybody else lives that way.
You may not be very good at it, but you might have some skeletons in your closet, you might have hidden agendas, you might have things that are hidden from public view. To be fair, we all have thoughts that we don’t want other people to know about.
“Well Pastor John, that will be not very good Christian faith talk that you are talking now.” Well, if I allow every thought that I think about to come out of my mouth, then I won’t live by faith. Because the devil wants me to speak words that create perceptions or that are my own desires, rather than speak the desire of God. So, all I’ve got to do is keep going back to truth. The more I go back to truth, the more my life and my words come into the ordained way of God, and then His will and His ordained way of living in my life, the good life comes to pass.
So, if I say to you you’re being invaded, you are being invaded, what am I talking about? I am talking about – there is a whole culture, a whole way of the world system, institutions that make you think things are important when they’re not. There is a whole momentum of humanity that is living that is surrounding you, that is trying to dictate to you how you must think, how you must speak, and how you must conduct your life. This is real.
If I take a simple thing like a phone, and I say to you, how important is your social media platform to you? Well, some of you might say, not at all, some of you would say some of it is. Well, you have a whole society that is trying to create a world order, using media as a platform to make you think something. [Pastor John laughs.]
You know, in America, right now there is about to be a very big election. I know because I am going to be in America at the time and I said to Pastor Sharon, it is amazing how many times I have been in America at this time of the year, when big elections are happening in America – strategic timings of things that are happening in America. Every time I was visiting Brother Jerry, I’d go and visit him, the five weeks, the seven weeks, his ministers conference always happens this time of the year and it just so happens often when I am there, there is a big election happening there.
So, the third most powerful person in America happens to be the Speaker of the House of Congress who dictates all of the, everything that happens in the House of Congress, the House of Representatives. Right now, that speaker’s name is Nancy Pelosi. Nancy Pelosi was on television in the course of this week, because everybody is electioneering and she made this comment, she said; “All the Republicans are talking about is inflation, inflation because inflation is at a high of more than forty years in America right now.” And so, everybody is just talking about inflation. This is what she said, she said, “We must change the conversation because we shouldn’t be talking about inflation, and if we are talking about inflation, we should be talking about the fact that if the Republicans take office, or take the congress, they’re going to increase inflation.” What is she trying to do? She is trying to leave you with a perception, that inflation is not their problem – number one, and number two, and it is not the most important thing. You know what conversation they are promoting in America as the number one conversation that they are trying to run their election campaigns on? Abortion. They are making abortion the single biggest event since the Supreme Court overturned the Roe v Wade which is a fifty-year-old transaction with Americans that allow Americans to have legal abortions. I don’t know the exact number right now, but I believe that over that period, there has been more than 17 million abortions in America. That means there is more violence and bloodshed in America than almost any other war that has ever produced almost anywhere because of killing unborn babies. They are running on that as the major issue because they are saying, that is undermining democracy.
So, why is this important? I am just telling you that they are denying the truth of what they have created in America as an economic momentum that has created inflation – they want to deny that so that you can vote the way that they want you to vote so they can remain in power. What is she trying to do? She is trying to invade your thinking, or America’s thinking – she is trying to invade the American’s way of thinking so that they are left with a perception so that they can vote the way she wants them to vote, rather than what is really going on in America. Hello everybody.
It is one of the most stark obvious things that I’ve ever heard coming out of a politician’s mouth in America. If you go to Harvard Business School; if you go to Wits Business School, UCT Business School, any business school anywhere in the world, they will tell you that the definition of a recession is more than two-quarters of negative growth in an economy. When they had two-quarters of negative growth in the economy in America, they started to redefine the term what recessions means, because they didn’t want to admit that their policies were creating a recession in America. What are they doing? They are invading people’s thoughts with their own ideas, so that they can change the way you think in line with the way they think, not on what is actually going on. So, they are using perception to create deception. The only way to undo perception and deception is to bring correction by bringing truth.
So, what has the Republican Party done and doing very successfully in America right now? They are campaigning, everything they’re doing is on how much are you paying for fuel which is year-on-year it’s fifty-seven percent or sixty percent higher than when he took office – President Bidon. Everybody knows this, if you go and buy anything at a grocery store, everything has increased in price significantly. There is a supply chain problem, there is a whole lot of problems in America economically right now. Everybody knows it every day. So, when Nancy Pelosi says in TV we must change the conversation, this is not really inflation. Everybody knows, she’s, she’s – it’s nonsense.
What she is really revealing is, this is the way we have always operated in the democratic party, and we are going to continue to operate that way because it has been successful for us in the past. Hello. So, if I say to you, you are being invaded, what is it that is invading you? What is invading you, is that there is a whole system of economics, a whole system of education, a whole system of relationships, a whole system of governance, a whole system that we live in in the world that is trying to influence your thinking so that you think like everybody else thinks that the institutions tell you to think, not like the Bible thinks.
If you and I only thought about economics the way the Bible talks about economics you and I would never have a financial problem, ever. Well, how do I know this? Because Jesus said if you first seek the kingdom and His way of doing things then all the things you need in life will be added to your life. You don’t have to work for it, or let’s rephrase that, you might have to work but the things you get won’t come as a result of your work, because your work will be your worship. Because everything you will be doing will be seeking Him first, so when you work, you work with worship, you don’t work to enrich yourself.
So, the world will tell you to work so that you can enrich yourself. Jesus says all that stuff is corruptible. It can be stolen from you, it can be rusted, it is transit – it is temporary. So why do you want to spend your whole life chasing temporary stuff when all the stuff that is really important to you is eternal stuff?
Well, Pastor John, I can’t do without money. Well, Jesus could. Well, how do I know that? He went across the water one day and he had an appointment that God wanted Him to have and He didn’t have money with Him, or He didn’t have enough money with Him and when He got to the other side, there was a new tax that has been imposed by somebody on that side of the water and they demanded to Jesus that He must pay tax. So, what did He say to Peter? He says, “Hey Peter, Judas is not with Me today, (probably for good reason). He is not with me today, so I don’t have a money bag, I want you to go fishing Pete. Go fishing. When you catch the fish, cut open the belly, there is a coin in the belly, pay the tax with it.” I can imagine Peter saying, “Go fishing when I need to pay my taxes?” Hello. Of course, Peter took the words of Jesus and he went fishing and he got the coin and he paid the taxes.
Come on, if you and I were completely in God’s economy we would never have to worry or wonder about what’s going to happen when I get to the other side – I’ve got to plan for that, I’ve got to save for that, I’ve got to take enough money for that. I’ve just got to know that if I am obeying God and I get to the other side, He is already there, waiting to take care of me – whatever the care needs to be.
But you see, we are so institutionalized in our thinking, that even when I speak like that, your mind is saying tilt – tilt. I am too far gone in the planning of my life. Don’t tell me I shouldn’t be planning about my future. Well, the same thing applies to relationships. How do you know what is a successful relationship? Who’s telling you? Who’s telling you what a good relationship looks like? From a friendship, to a marriage, to a parent-child relationship – who’s telling you what a successful relationship looks like? Where are you getting your information? Someone else told you. Society told you, institutions tell you, psychologists tells you, your own desires tell you. Don’t shout me down because I am preaching good. Actually, no, you must shout me down. Come on, I am going to live by my own words here. Shout me down. Come on, shout me down. Good preaching Pastor John! Good preaching, yes, hallelujah!
Who’s telling you what a good relationship is? If you’re not getting it from the Bible, then anything else is coming to invade your world and trying to dictate what your relationship looks like.
Well, I am about to get myself into a good kind of trouble. If you are a young adult, the world will tell you, you shouldn’t get married until you have had sex. And you should know what kind of sex you want before you get married so that you can have a fulfilling sexual relationship with the partner you’re eventually going to marry. Well, that’s what the whole world will tell you. Cause everybody is doing it, so it must be right.
Don’t look at me ‘skeef’ like that. So, but what is the truth of God’s word? What does He say about it? He say, “Don’t do that, it’s not good for you.” “Why not?” Because your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. Give your body as an offering to God and let HIm deal with your desires and let Him give you the relationship that you want and then the marriage bed, the Bible says, the marriage bed is undefiled. You will have joy in that relationship because God is part of it. Well, Pastor John, “How am I going to know what is good sex?” Well, if it’s good for you and your partner, then it’s good. Who else is going to tell you what good sex looks like? Come on. Ja, I know you’re in church on a Sunday morning. You see, if I don’t bring correction from the Word of God, then you live with the deception that is based on perception of what everybody else is telling you what good relationships should look like. So by the time you’re 16, you should have at least kissed somebody, you should have at least done this, you should have at least done that. You can I mean, it’s unbelievable what’s happening in schools around the world, even in our own schools here, what kind of teaching they’re teaching kids from a young age of what, what sexual activity to engage in or watch out for or don’t do.
Institutions are telling us that the way to overcome AIDS is to have protected sex. They don’t tell you to not have sex. They tell you, have protected sex. Those are the people that want to tell you how to have a good relationship. Come on, shout me down. Come on, shout me down. So those same people they want you to, they want you to, they want to tell you what to do with your money. They want to tell you how to spend your money, they want to tell you what to do with your energy. They want to tell you what to do with your skills and your talent and what you must do with your potential. The same people want to tell you what’s right or wrong for you in your life and they know what they get it from who? They get it from everybody else that’s been invaded by thoughts. The devil doesn’t have to do half the work that is done by the institutions and by society and culture and everybody else, the devil doesn’t have to, doesn’t have to do the work. The institutions are doing the work for him. Because anything that’s leading you to live that way is telling you, you don’t need God.
So I read from 2 Peter, I’m reading from 2 Peter 2 and I’m reading from verse 18. 18 For these people, they speak with great swelling words of emptiness. They allure through the lusts of the flesh, through lewdness, the ones who have actually escaped from these from those who live in error (2 Peter 2:18 NKJV). I strongly encourage you to go and read this whole book of Peter and see what he’s talking about. 19 While they promise them liberty, that’s people in the Church, while they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption. For by whom a person is overcome by him also who is brought into bondage (2 Peter 2:18-19 NKJV). So this scripture is saying, the person who tells you what to do, you are bondage to that person. You are in bondage to that person’s thoughts, you’re in bondage to that person’s words, you’re in bondage to that person’s ideas. So who’s the book, who’s Peter writing to? Peter is writing to the Church. He’s talking to people that have come into the Church and become Christians in the Church. Then they changed their mind about Christianity and they decided that they’ve got their own ideas about Christianity and they stopped living by Christ’s words.
Okay, so these people, they come amongst you and they speak empty words and so, 19 they themselves are corruption and for whom by a person is overcome by him also, who is brought into bondage, he is brought into bondage. 20 For if, after they escaped the pollutions of the world, through the knowledge of the Lord our Saviour, Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the latter end is worse for them than the beginning (2 Peter 2:19,20 NKJV). So, if you became free by coming into the words of Jesus Christ, then you listen to institutions and you listen to worldly philosophies and you listen to other Christians who have got a way of loving their Christianity and then, and they are corrupted. And they bring the same corruption into the Church and you listen to them, then you are again entangled by the thing that God has set you free from. Then the end of you is worse than the beginning because now you know better and yet you choose worse.
So Pastor John, the better idea is just to keep living in deception. Does that make sense to you? It’s like knowing you’re going to get invaded and you say, “Okay, I’m going to be there and I don’t care what’s going to happen to me, just come in and do whatever, whether you kill me or you don’t kill me. Just don’t let me know what time you’re coming.” Does that make sense to you? No way. You’re not going to let that happen to you. If you know someone’s coming to invade you, you’re going to make sure you’re gone. Or you’re going to make sure you have an equal opposing force to counteract the invasion. What am I telling you today? I’m telling you today, what’s invading your thoughts? What do you have to do? You’ve got to get an equal opposing powerful force to negate your invasion. Where do you get it from? The truth – the Word of God. It’s the only way to beat deception. 21 It would have been better for them to not have known the way of righteousness than having known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them. 22 But it has happened to them according to the true proverb, a dog returns to its own vomit and a sow having washed to her own wallowing in the mire (2 Peter 2:21-22 NKJV).
What do you and I want to do? Do we want to go back and live in the mess of the world system? Come on, do we want to go and live by all of the rules that allow divorce to be rampant in Church? There are as many people being divorced in the Church of the Lord Jesus as in the world. Why is that? Well, because the Church has adopted all of the institutional lies about relationships and so they think it’s okay to live like everybody else lives in the world. So we’ll just get married and if it doesn’t work, we’ll divorce. No, I don’t accept that. So Pastor John, have you presided over divorces in the past? Yes, I have. Well, why has it happened? Because perception has led to deception and then there is no truth that is allowed to come in and change the perception and the deception. And if you want to keep living in the deception and you are like a pig that goes back to its mud after you’ve been washed or a dog returns to his vomit, you got back to a system that undermines your ability to live life with joy and prosperity and increase.
So I go to chapter three, verse one, second Peter, 1 Beloved, I now write to you the second epistle (in both of which I stir up your minds by way of reminder), I stir up your thinking, I stir up your meditation by way of reminder, 2 that you may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us, the apostles of the Lord and Saviour. What’s he saying? There has been prophets in the past, in the Old Testament, and there are commandments of God and now there are us, the apostles in the New Testament – special messengers, that are sent with words to remind you of who you are in Christ.
3 Knowing this first: that scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts (2 Peter 3:1-3 NKJV). What is a scoffer? A scoffer is someone to jeer or to deride or mock, to delude; to deceive. A scoffer is someone who will deceive. So these scoffers that will come amongst us, who will come to deceive, will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts. So who are these people that will come in the old days that will walk in according to the last. It is whatever they decide is right for them; not as what is truth, but what is right for them. In other words, they have a perception that has become a deception that they choose to live by and so as they continue to live in this deception, they live how they choose to love. They don’t live by what God’s Word says they must live.
These people, they come around you. Verse four, and saying, 4 “Where is the promise of His coming? the coming of Jesus. For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation. 5 For this they willfully forget: that by the word of God, the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of water and in the water, 6 by which the world that then existed perished, being flooded with water. Verse eight, 8 But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. 9 The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness (2 Peter 3:4-9 NKJV).
So what is he saying, as some count slackness? In other words, I don’t see the results that I think I should see in the timeframe that I think I should see them. Therefore, God is slack with His promise. So I measure God by my own perception. So because I measure God, by my own timeframe and my own perception, I consider God to be slacking not coming through to His promises. Cause they say, God has promised that He’s coming back in 1000s of years and in generation and generation, He hasn’t come back yet. So when’s He going to come back? On this fundamental promise, He hasn’t yet come back. I argue to, I would have a different opinion. I think He’s back. How’s he back? He’s back in you. There is a time coming when He’s coming back. But He’s already back. He’s back in you.
So what are we to say, 9 As some count slackness that is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish But they all should come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9 NKJV). So why hasn’t He come back yet as in the backness of the way they say He’s coming back? Because that’s a perception. That unless He comes back in the way they say he should come back, they say He’s slack, but it’s the way they think He should come back. It’s not what they say, what Jesus meant.
So they are already deceived because they’re measuring God by their own perception. And these are the people that are among us, and they want to tell us how we must live, and they don’t have a clue. Come on. Come on [Congregation says: you are preaching good Pastor John]. Again, come on [Congregation says: You are preaching good Pastor John]. 10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up. 11 Therefore, since all these things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, 12 looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat? 13 Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells (2 Peter 3:10-13 NKJV). Come on now.
If you dwell on the earth, are you dwelling in righteousness? If you pray and say, 9 Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. 10 Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven (Matt 6:9-10 NKJV). Did Jesus come to fulfill that prayer? He did. He brought heaven to earth. So are we not living in a place of righteousness, in the way that we choose to live in the heavenly realm that we live in? Part of this is already happening. Not all of it, but part of it is already happening. Praise the Lord. I told you, I’m going to talk about end times. I’m making my way there. But I need to make sure that you get this properly.
Therefore, beloved, looking for verse 14, 14 Therefore, beloved, looking forward to these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, without spot and blameless. So none of us are perfect, but in our spirit, man we are. So we can say that before God. 15 and consider that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation—as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you, 16 as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction (2 Peter 3:14-16 NKJV). Here’s Peter talking about Paul’s revelations, and how some of them are difficult to understand. But nevertheless, people use his words to twist it to their own destruction. What are they doing? They say, “We don’t understand these words. Therefore, because we don’t understand what the Apostle Paul preaches. We can’t know how to live by them. So how do we live them?” Then we live according to the way we think is best for us to live. But the Apostle Paul clearly writes, and he says, “You are the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, you are the ones that are called before anything before God ordained, He already knew what His plan and purpose was for your life.” Romans, Ephesians, Corinthians – He talks about all of these things where He will use the foolishness of the born-again Christian to confound the so-called wise of the world.
You mean, you as a born-again Christian, are smarter than anybody else that’s in the world system? Yeah, you are. Well, it’s some people are very clever there, out there, you know… Lawyers and doctors and all kinds of smart people that do smart things. Yeah, but they dom. They `are, because they put themselves as a god. And they proclaim the god that they serve as the highest form of God. One such god is the god of education. Well, if you don’t have a proper education then you’re not successful in life, enough. [Pastor John acts and sounds out as if he is shooting a gun]. What am I shooting? A holy cow.
You know, the world system wants to tell you what their gods are. Their god is education. Their god is money. Their god is sexuality or sensuality. Their god is anything but the most high God. And so it doesn’t matter how clever they are they stupid. Because of all their intelligence, they make the things of God as though it’s trivial. That’s not really how you should live. We can tell you how to live because we got all the smarts. This is really big in America right now. It’s one of the things that has really overturned the political system is because the teachers union in America is trying to tell parents that they are not as important as the schooling education system is, because those knowledgeable people know what to teach your kids, you as a parent don’t. This is real. It’s happening right now in America. I’ll tell you something, it’s happening in South Africa. Laws are busy being put in Parliament for our country to go the same way. Because they want to promote their god’s not the most high God. Come on, you can say it again [Congregation says: you are preaching good Pastor John].
17 You therefore, beloved, since you know this beforehand, beware lest you also fall from your own steadfastness (2 Peter 3:17 NKJV).be careful that you don’t fall from your steadfastness. What is that? I’m going to live by the truth of God’s Word. I’m going to live by the truth. I’m not going to live by what other people tell me is their gods. Have you seen people that go to… well, I can’t talk so much for girls, I can only really talk for the guys. Because I haven’t actually ever been in a gym where I’ve watched girls workout, like, proper workout, you know? I believe they do, but I just, I don’t watch them. I don’t look for them. You know, I haven’t ever. I’ve only got eyes for one girl. But I know that there are, I know from the men that I’ve been around, they go and they take the weight and they go and stand in front of the mirror [Pastor John makes as if he is lifting dumbells]. And they make sure everybody else is watching. And if there’s nobody watching they go and stand in front of other guys there, and they feel like yeah today I worked my tries and I worked up my bies, and I’m feeling my arms are nice and pumped. And they will go and stand in front, “You see that person over there?” And they show you the tri like this [Pastor John pointing but purposefully showing off his arms], you know? “And you know, over there” [Pastor John pointing but purposefully showing off his arms]. You know. “And you see hey, you see, yeah, did you check it out hey? [Pastor John pointing but purposefully showing off his arms] You know what they’re doing? They’re showing you what’s their god.
Their god is their body. And they do everything they can to make their body look so sensational. Well, what about the fact that their body is the temple of the Holy Spirit? Are you prepared to give the same energy that you give to the growth of your body? To prayer? To the Word of God? Are you prepared to do that? Come on now. Pastor John, you just ruined my workout. Good. Good. Why don’t you start this way? Why don’t you start to say, “Well, why don’t I give more time to prayer and being in the Word and listening to Foot in the Message type of stuff? And then when I’ve done that, I’ll go work out.” Then see how quickly your body starts to shout at you. And the God of your world that you’ve created for yourself speaks to you and said, “Don’t leave me. Don’t leave me. Don’t leave me. Don’t leave me. I’m too important to you. Don’t leave me. Or let’s just all put everybody in the same basket here. Stop eating for a week. And spend your time that you would spend eating praying. See how quickly your body says to you, “Do you don’t leave me. Don’t leave me. Don’t leave me.” Ya neh?
So Matthew chapter 24. Eventually, I’ve got there Matthew 24. And this is a very, very powerful chapter and when I come back from America, I’m going to minister on this. 1 Then Jesus went out, verse one, from the temple, and His disciples came up to showing Him the buildings of the temple. And his disciples came up to him, came up to show Him the buildings of the temple. Why? Why, they were showing Him what the order of the system looks like. 1 And Jesus answered them and said to them, “Do you not see all these things? All of these buildings. Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down.” Verse Three, 3 Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will all these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?”
4 And Jesus answered and said to them: “Take heed that no one deceives you. 5 For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many. I’m not going to talk beyond that today. But I am just going to read you the next few verses. 6 And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. 7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are the beginning of sorrows (Matthew 24:1-8 NKJV). And Jesus is saying, but the time is not yet.
I’m not even going to go further than that today. I’m going to focus just for five more minutes on these, this one scripture, or this, one thing that Jesus said, “Take heed that no one deceives you 5 For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many (Matthew 24:4-5 NKJV). That word deceive in the Greek word is to seduce, to cause to stray, to lead astray, to lead aside from the right way to go. The metaphors of this word deceive, is to lead away from the truth and to lead into error. To deceive, to be led into error to be led aside from the path of virtue or to go astray. So, Jesus is very specific about this. He’s talking about the major issue that He’s talking to His disciples with is not about the coming, it’s about living. It’s not about when it’s going to happen, because I will read to you later and you can prepare yourself for the time that I come back. But I will read to you later in Matthew chapter 24, where Jesus says, I don’t even know, only the Father knows when the time of this thing is going to come to an end. So what is Jesus focusing when He talks to them?
You can read in the next passage of verses, He’s going to talk about the 10 virgins, five of which have enough, more than enough oil, five don’t. He’s going to talk about talents, five talents, two talents, and one talent. He’s going to talk about people what they do with their talents. But I want you to notice that what Jesus is focusing on is what you do with your time when you’re on the earth that you don’t get deceived. Not to focus on the time that is coming. Rather to focus on you and the time that you’re living in. Don’t let anyone deceive you. So are you still with me for five more minutes here? Be careful. If you give me five I could take ten. But I’m preaching good this morning, you already said so many times. And I’m leaving you for a couple of weeks. I gotta get this out before I go so just give me just a couple of minutes here.
Okay. We in this ministry have had the Word of the Lord come to us. Over the last couple of years, I will take the children. And so He’s taking the children. Why does Jesus want to take the children? Because the older generation of people are so consumed by what they have been taught as the right way that they no longer want to pursue the right way. Because the right way might be contrary to the way they’ve grown up. And the way that they’ve done everything by. So don’t tell me my life has been incorrect till now. Well listen, if you’re not open to that correction, then you are all going to die. Excuse me, but you will die in your own deception rather than dying in correction.
I’ll tell you what. Jesus is very, very powerful with this when He talks about the parable of a man who was looking for workers. He goes in the morning, and then he comes back at lunchtime. And then at one hour to go in the day goes and fetches people, I’d rather be the one hour person that gets only one hour of work and get the same pay then actually dying without pay. But you see people that were still sitting in the square with one hour left to go in the day, people will say to them, “Why are you still sitting in the square when there’s no time left in a day for anybody to employ you?” So why did Jesus use that parable? Because it takes as much faith to keep sitting in the square the whole day as to say, afternoon time, lunchtime, it’s time to go home, there’s obviously not work for me. So there was still a level of expectation and anticipation with one hour to go.
Let’s rather end our lives with an anticipation and expectation of being corrected. And walking in new truth, rather than hanging on to old truth. That for generations, we were taught to think this way to behave this way to live this way. So it must be the right way. Because our grandpa did it. And our great grandpa did it, and everybody else has had it. And we’ve had generations of people that have done it this way. So we must.
Why do you want to stick to that level of life? Well, because you don’t understand Pastor John, it’s hard to kick against our whole social order. I know. That’s what Jesus said. Broad is the way that leads to anybody who wants to walk on this way of distruction. But narrow, constricted by pressure is the way that leads to life. You’re not gonna get to the truth, if you’re not prepared to put up with some pressure. So when that happens, all the… God started to deal with the young people. And the young people started to have conversations with their parents. And I thank God that the parents decided that they are going to hear God and they are going to not cling to their old ideas. They are going to go with what God is saying. And they allow their children to make decisions for God instead of trying to take them back to what their social order said they must live by. I am truly grateful and thankful to those parents.
Now, I’m going to ask you to live in my world for a minute. I’m going to ask you to live with me in my world. As the spiritual leader of the church, you were the platform that God used to speak this word out to say I will take the children, these children come into my world. They are living with their energy, they’re living with their talents, their callings, their potential, they are living in my world where do you think the enemy will try and deceive me? Come on. Help me now. Where do you think my war is? With this whole thing that’s going on here. I’ll tell you where my war is. The enemy comes to me and he says to me: “John, what gives you the right to say that you’ve got the truth that all these young people are giving their best of their lives to God under your leadership. What if you’ve got it wrong? What if you’ve got it wrong?” Why am I shouting? Because that’s how he shouts to me “What if you and Sharon have got it wrong? What if you are going against the very things that you’re supposed to be right about?”
You think the devil is gonna leave me alone for one minute? Why do you think he’s coming after me? Because if he can get me to quit on this, any compromise I make on this potentially stops everybody from walking in the absolute truth of God’s freedom. So what’s my alternative? My alternative is either I don’t compromise or I must completely compromise. I can’t go halfway here. Right, I can’t go halfway here. So what does my compromise look like? Come on, work with me now. The devil has gotta be talking to some of you this way too. What does my compromise look like? My compromise looks like this. So John, why don’t you just let them come and stay here for a year or two, and then let them go and do what they’re supposed to do? You think I’m living in a world that’s oblivious to talk?
Everybody’s souls that are having the devil come after your thoughts is the same devil that’s coming after my thoughts. But I have to stand before God, this is a matter that you do not have to stand before God on. I do. Because God has given me the instruction, that is my responsibility to watch out for your souls. Because one day I’m gonna stand before Him. And I must give an account to Him that either I spoke the truth or I didn’t. I have to stand before God right now every day and account to Him about what I’m doing for you. This is not something that I’m going to face when I get to heaven. Jesus lives with me every day with my calling. And with my gifting and with my anointing and with the way that I lead you. I have no escape here. I answer to Him. Well, you might say, “Well, Pastor John, I wish you the answer to us.” You don’t want me to answer you? Because then if I answer to you, I’m gonna go with whatever’s the most prominent influencing voice that I must go with.
Shout me down. Come on. Come on, come on, come on. You think the devil just leaves me alone? Let me tell you, the devil comes after me more than you think. Why? Because if he can get me to compromise and me to quit on my thinking, and my leadership here, he’s got us all. So what’s my options? Okay, John, why don’t you just let them come for a year or two? And then they must leave. And let them go and let them go and do whatever university education, go do whatever business they must do, you go and do whatever they must do.
Oh, okay, so now I’m the one who must decide? I must decide what God’s plan is for everybody’s life. That’s not my job. Whose job is it? It’s between them and God. Okay, so Pastor John, what’s their future look like? Are you asking that question? Are you asking like, “God, John, what is their future look like?” Or are you asking the question, “I know what their future looks like.” It’s two different ways of looking at this thing. Because if you’re asking the question, what does the future look like? Then you’re uncertain about what God is saying. But if you say, “I know what they look like”, then you’re speaking words that God would speak over them, because He’s not confused about their future. So I know what their future looks like. They’re in God’s hands.
When I got married to Pastor Sharon, the Word of the Lord came to me and said to me, “I must love her and give my life up for her as Christ loves me and gave His life up for me.” And when I followed that through, completely the way God told me to love her completely without compromise. In other words, just what it looked like, I didn’t put anything of myself on the table as something that is open for negotiation. Everything that we talked about in our marriage was me giving up my own desires to love her completely. Is that not what Jesus did? So what was my motivation for that? I wanted to have a marriage that was more beautiful, more powerful, more spectacular than anything I could see around me. There was no marriage that I could see around me. That was enough of an example to me. Especially my parents, that I wanted to have a marriage like that.
So where did I go? I went to the Bible. All of my friends said, “John, she’s got you, around her little finger. We can see who wears the pants in the house. And you’ve obviously given up your status as a man to be completely dominated by a woman.” I said, “No, guys, you don’t understand. I’m being dominated by the Word of God, not by a woman.” Yeah, that’s convenient for you to say, Pastor. John, they didn’t call me Pastor at that time, I was just a guy going to work every day. It’s all good for you to say, John. But, you know, you’re the one doing all the giving. She’s giving up nothing. I said, “And so what? Does that make me say I mustn’t do the Bible?” No but we don’t see any pastors or anybody else living like that. So what does that mean? I mustn’t do the Bible? Just because other pastors don’t live that way doesn’t mean to say the Bible is not true. And so this is no one else’s marriage but mine. So stick it.
That’s what I told them and every time I would come into their company, they would it’s just about all they could talk about was the fact that I would go to church and give the rest of my life to loving my wife. Besides being at work, when I have to be at work. So eventually, I came to the point where I couldn’t spend time with them, because all they would tell me is how wrong I am. So I had to make a choice, I’m either going to follow them or I’m going to follow God. So I said, “I’m going to follow God.” All of those guys, all of them are divorced, some of them not once, some of them two, three times already. All of those guys, they have no relationship with their kids. Well most of them, or very difficult relationships.
[Pastor John is pointing at Pastor Sharon] She is my joy. She is my beloved. These are words we use with each other every day, she is deeply satisfying to me. The Bible says, “That if I would live that way, I will present her to myself with glory and splendor without spot or blemish.”
That’s the way she will become to me. That’s the promise I held on to when we were newly married, three years, four years, five years, six years, when all people will tell you those are the most turbulent years of our marriage. We had our fair share of difficulties, but I held on to the Word of truth, that I would live this marriage and reap all the benefits of the Word in my marriage, not what everybody else was telling me.
“Well, John, it’s not possible for any man to live like that. You’re talking about a level that is so high, that is so above other…” Many, many men have come and told me this. And many of those men have left my church. Because they would say, “The standard that you lift up as a standard of marriage, we can’t live that way.” That’s your choice. That’s your words, of your choice. Just because you think that I’ve got some kind of special anointing because I’m the Pastor… I was not a Pastor when I would make the choice to live like this in my marriage. I was 23, 24, 25-year old young man that wanted everything out of marriage that any other man would want. I wanted to come home to a joyful home, I wanted to come home to kids that were a joy in my household. I wanted to come home to a wife that I could be affectionate with and she could be affectionate back to me in every sense of the Word. I wanted to live life with joy and peace. I wanted to live life with purpose and with honour and with dignity. And God’s Word gave me all of that. So I have to take that as a foundation. And I have to say, if I can trust God, with all of my future in my marriage, if I can trust God with all of my future in those of my son’s lives, and my grandchildren that are coming through. If I can trust God with that truth, if I can trust God with my money, with my finances, if I can trust Him with that truth, and He has never let me down.
Then I’ve got something I can go back to and say, “Doesn’t matter what the devil comes to tell me about the children. I’ve got to trust them to God.” I’ve got to trust them to God. “So what does that look like Pastor John?” If I could predict the future, you would be lining up to give me hundreds of thousands of bucks. Well, if Jesus says, “I don’t even know what time I’m going to come back when the Father is going to…” Why did the Father keep that from Jesus? Why? I don’t know. But He did. Jesus admitted it. Go read it in Matthew 24. Jesus admitted it. No one knows the hour, except the Father. Does He know it now? Maybe. He was talking in His humanity then or He was talking while He was on the Earth. Let’s put it that way. I don’t know. But I do know this: That we wouldn’t have to live in faith, by faith, if we knew everything that was going to happen tomorrow. So I’ll go back to this. Okay, I’m going to walk on the stage to make you know that I’m closing.
I do know this. That the only thing that the devil’s got going for him, is performance. Because he has no power. So he wants to use your power of creation and your power of choice to make you perform according to his deception, which he creates through perception. The only way to walk free from performance is to walk in power. How do you walk in power? You walk in power by the Word of God. Not by the institutions of society, in all its forms.
So if I’ve got to talk to you about the end times, I cannot talk to you about the end times other than to say to you, or before I make a firm foundation, and say to you, Jesus said, “Do not be deceived. Let no man deceive you.” And yet, what is the whole world system trying to do to us? Deceive us. Into doing what? Into saying our religion, our walk with God is powerless. Do you see this? Everybody says put power in education, put your power in the way the world provides for you. Put all of your trust into the system. Don’t put your trust in God. He’s not trustworthy. If He cannot tell you when He’s going to come and He said He’s coming back. And if He’s not even come back yet, after all of these generations of people, how can you trust God? So don’t put your trust in God. Put your trust in everything that everybody else knows. So that’s all performance-based. And God says, “Don’t live in a performance-based world. Live in a power-based world. It’s the power of the Holy Spirit. It’s the power of the Word. It’s the power of God that leads us to salvation. Stand with me, please. Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. Praise Jesus. Praise Jesus. Praise Jesus. Praise Jesus. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Praise Jesus. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.
I trust today that you have got a glimpse into the way the Word talks about the end times. The biggest focus that Jesus had is don’t let any man deceive you. Don’t be deceived by people that come. Don’t be deceived by even… and I’ll get to this next time. … by many people that come with a message that says, “Listen to my message that I’ve got to preach, because this is the right message.” I always tell you this – if it’s in the Word of God, believe it. If it’s me that’s speaking don’t believe it. If it’s the Word of God, believe it. Believe what the Word says. This messenger has just got a way of delivering it to you so that given our current way that we live, it’s more understandable to you. Hallelujah.
Praise the Lord, put your hand on your heart like this, and say, “Jesus, I thank You, that You are my Lord, You are my Saviour. I thank You, that it’s not my will, but Your will that is done in my life. I decide today that I’m going to live with Your power, not my performance, in Jesus’ Name. Where I’m weak, I thank You that You make me strong, in Jesus’ Name, Amen.
I declare over you that the Word of God is your primary source of life, and that there is no other god before you. That there is only the Word that is before you. I ask the Father that He would bless you and keep you and that you would live in peace and prosperity and the goodness of God. I ask the Father, in the Name of Jesus, that you are blessed in everything that you do. No weapon formed against you prospers, not against your health, not against your wealth, not against your body, not against your work, not against your relationships. He protects you from all things in Jesus’ Name. By His Word, and by the Blood of Jesus. Hallelujah. And I declare Shalom over you. Nothing missing, and nothing broken in your life. The peace of God rules and reigns in your mind and your heart. Hallelujah. Glory to God.
I want you just to stretch out your hands to me now. And I just want you to agree with me right now that as I go to be with Brother Jerry, in the next day or two, I want you to agree with me that God has prepared my way. And He has everything that He has prepared for me and Brother Jerry, to walk in over these next two weeks, that all of it will come to pass. And none of it will be undone in Jesus’ Name. And that all of our speakings, all of our joining together in walking together will fulfill everything that it was meant to fulfill and accomplish in Jesus’ Name. And I declare and I pray that when I come back, I will come with new things. I will come with the things that God wants to impart. And He wants me to see and wants me to walk in, and I receive those things and bring them back to you in the Name of Jesus. Hallelujah. Glory to God.
Thank you. I know, I told Pastor Sharon when I was with you in prayer on Tuesday night, digitally, I said to her when she got home, I was deeply moved, actually, by your prayers for me. It really moved me on Tuesday night – almost to tears. Actually, I was so deeply moved, because I said to Sharon, you know when I hear people praying for me like that, it is a very humbling thing. Because you choose to give your time, and your energy, and your life, and your love for Jesus, and you choose to come, and pray that over me. And it is a great, great and wonderful, and precious thing to me. And so I thank you for praying for me, and I thank you for praying for Brother Jerry. I thank you for praying for all that God is doing with us. Hallelujah.
Thank you for coming to church. Thank you for being part of an amazing thing that God is doing amongst us. Hallelujah. God bless you. Bye everybody.
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TOUCH | TEACH | TRAIN | TRANSFER
