Church Gone Wild, Week 1

Tim Rivers | July 7, 2024

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What's up everybody? Can you give some praise to Jesus in this place? Can you really give some praise to Jesus in this place? Can anybody testify to the goodness of the Lord? Here's the thing, your praise is dependent on you. No one can praise God for what He's done in your life like you can, and here's the thing, God sending his only son gave his life for you. How much more would give our life back to him and praise and worship and adoration and somebody say, amen. Hey, I'm glad that you're here. It's been a while since I've been up here. We've been on vacation, so the month of June, we take the month of June off. I don't preach here in the month of June, and it is a time for our family to recharge and recalibrate and take a vacation. And here's the thing. We preach about work hard, play hard work, but also find time to rest. If you're going to make it in life, you got to learn how to take breaks and take rest, but I don't just want to preach it. Our family practices as well. So we want you to do that as well, and I want to thank this church so much for your faithfulness, for allowing us the opportunity to do that and for those that held it down,

Michael Pitman, Sarah Bebo, crystal Walker, can you give them a big old hand? Man, they did such an amazing job. As somebody said, our bench runs deep. God has blessed us here at embassy to have amazing speakers and preachers that are in this body, and I'm so glad for them taking the time out to spend time with the Lord, pray about what the series is going to be and then deliver it, and they did an amazing job. All the men make some noise in this place. This is your opportunity to check out your vibrato and how low you can go. Why is it that when you call on men, we can't just be like, yeah, it's like, yeah, all men, if you're a man in this place, we invite you this Friday to our men's event. Come on, make some noise. It starts at seven o'clock. Here's the thing, here are the only two qualifications that you need to be there. If you're a man and you want to be a kingdom man, kingdom roll up, we're going to have a good time. How many know that our culture right now has a concerted effort to destroy manhood,

Good godly kingdom manhood? Well, guess what? The enemy will not prevail.

God created men and women to live in their full potential and whatever culture is doing, whatever society is doing to try to blur the lines, to try to destroy what womanhood and manhood looks like in the biblical form, we come against it in the name of Jesus. And so we invite you, if you are excited about what God's doing in your life, you want to know more about how depressed into being a kingdom man be here. We're going to have a great time, a great word, and then of course we're going to have great food. They say to a man, I knew that was going to get somebody. I don't know about the word and the worship, but I'm coming for the barbecue. They say the way to a man's heart is through his stomach. So for some of y'all single ladies looking for man, try that. Get some new recipes. Start a group. Singles cooking. I'm meddling now, but watch somebody start that group this fall. What I just gave you, kingdom strategies to hook a kingdom man, man shall not live by bread alone, but it doesn't say that man will not live by bread,

Especially some homemade bread sourdough. It has nothing to do with my sermon. I'm sorry, I'm going to bring it back. This is what happens when you've taken vacation. I'm living in the overflow right now. Okay, let me get back on topic. Hey, so today we are starting a new series that we're calling Church Gone Wild

And y'all need to go ahead and buckle up because for the next few weeks we're going to get into the Church of Corinth and we're going to look at some of the wild things that were happening in that church and how Paul addresses those issues with biblical principles. Now, what you're going to find out, spoiler alert, is that the Church of Corinth is not much different than what we're dealing with today. So it's very important for us that when we identify and see things within the church that are not reflective of the kingdom of God, we need to know how do we address these things from a biblical perspective. Here's what's crazy.

I felt like the Lord gave me this word in May when we were in the Do You Mind series? I felt impressed. The Lord said, Hey, the next series you do church going wild. Take a walk through Corinth, the Church of Corinth and talk about these subjects. And I said, alright, God. So I got with the team, we got the plans together, did all the graphics laid out kind of how the sermons are going to go. And lo and behold, in the last few weeks, y'all know the church has been rocked, especially within just our metroplex. We've had a couple pastors, several pastors that had to resign some bad stuff. What's interesting is that God gave me this word to present to you prior to any of this stuff happening, and it's amazing to me how God does that. God is never caught off guard.

He's never caught off guard. He knows all things. Nobody's fooling God. So I think this is going to be a really relevant word to us in this season that we're in and somebody say, amen. Amen. Grab your bibles. We're going to one Corinthians chapter one, the book of one Corinthians chapter one ton. Verse number one says, Paul called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus and our brothers softness to the church of God that is in Corinth to those sanctified in Christ Jesus called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their God, both their Lord and ours grace to you and peace from God, our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus, that in every way you were enriched in Him, in all speech, in all knowledge, even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you so that you are not lacking in any gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, pay attention to this who will sustain you to the end

By whom you were called into the fellowship of His son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Verse number nine, God is faithful by whom you were called into the fellowship of his son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. Here's my topic for today. He will sustain you If you don't hear nothing else today, hear this, he will sustain you. Turn to your neighbor and say, neighbor, neighbor, he will sustain you. Look at your other neighbor, the one you really like and say, he will sustain you. Now point your finger at yourself and say, God, my God, my God. We'll sustain me, me, and if you believe it, give God some praise. Just take 10 seconds and give God praise if you believe that he's going to sustain you to the end.

Well, y'all better get ready. I've been on vacation. I'm ready to preach a word today, and we Father, we're so grateful, so thankful that we're in your presence. I pray God that you would take over. You're already in this place now. I pray that we would have open ears, open hearts, open minds to receive your word. Do what only you can do. I pray that your anointing and that your presence would fill every heart, that you would change every life, that whatever we came in here with, whatever burdens we're carrying, I pray that we would lay it down at your feet and that we would take your yoke upon us, which is easy and light. We give you name, the praise and the glory for what you're getting ready to do in Jesus name. And everybody say amen. Amen. He will sustain you. Now we're going to go through the Church of Corinth chapters First Corinthians and second Corinthians, but I want to give you a little bit of context and create the setting in which Paul is writing these letters to the Church of Corinth because first Corinthians is one of several letters that Paul is writing to the church of Corinth in response to some issues that he's been made aware of from the house of Chloe.

Now, we don't really know who Chloe is, but we know that Chloe's got the tea. She was probably a group leader.

She got some information about some stuff that was happening and the scripture says that somehow most likely with a letter correspondence, word gets to Paul. Paul is in Ephesus at the time and somebody writes to him and says, yo, Paul, you got to address some issues that are happening here in the church of Corinth. Paul is writing this letter to the church of Corinth, but what you have to understand about the church of Corinth is that Corinth as a city was the main hub of trade. It was a place that was considered to be opulent. It had great success. If you wanted money, if you wanted prestige, you move to Corinth. It was a Greco-Roman society, and so it was influenced by both Grecian philosophy and Roman politics and it was the hip hop happening place. It was Tokyo, it was New York, it was Chicago, it was San Francisco, it was Dallas.

It was the place to be. And so as great as all those things were, there was a problem also within Corinth, which was that Corinth was also the main hub for sexual immorality and idolatry. So much so that because Grecian and Roman philosophy in terms of sexuality was very open. So in fact, there was the temple of several temples to different idols and different gods and goddesses, but one of the main temples was the temple of Aphrodite, which was on top of a mountain. And in this temple, the temple employed a thousand priestesses, which were actually prostitutes. And every day the historians said that there would be a thousand prostitutes that would descend from that temple and they would make their way through the streets trying to implore men to engage with them. And Paul goes to Corinth, he sees all of this and he says, this is a great place to plant a church. How many know that where sin runs rapid, the church is necessary, culture is going buck wild. Paul says, Hey, I'm going to plant a church here. You can read about this in Acts chapter 18. So Paul plants a church. He's there for about a year and a half, and then he turns it over to a man by the name of Apollo and then he goes on some missionary journeys. Within a few couple of years of him being gone, he gives word that the church has gone wild.

So he begins to write to the church of Corinth, and what he finds out is that the problem within Corinth wasn't that they were so much, they were influenced by external culture, but Paul didn't write the letter of Corinthians to address necessarily the external pressure. He was dealing with internal pressure. Now, it's one thing to get in an argument with your neighbor to fuss and fight with somebody that you don't really know. They don't mow the yard, right? They got too many cars parked in the driveway. Why do you have a garage and turn into a self storage? Oh, I just felt conviction. Y'all know anybody have some crazy neighbors? Y'all are afraid that they may be here, but it's one thing to get into a discussion or an argument with somebody you barely know, but how many know that it's way more intense and brutal when you have a family feud? Some of y'all know what I'm talking about. You've been to the family barbecue where Aunt Sue's ex-husband brought his new girlfriend to the, this is what Paul is dealing with. He's looking around and he realizes that there are several issues within the church of Corinth. They had preferred preachers. Some said, I'm of Paul. Some said, I'm Paul. Some said I'm of sees, which was Peter. Some say that I'm of Christ. There was discussions about sexual immorality. There was a young man who was having relationships with his stepmother and he wouldn't stop doing it.

There was an issue where people were suing each other in open court within the church. There were discussions about the Lord's Supper. There were discussions about spiritual gifts. There were problems about marriage, divorce, and remarriage. There were discussions about the resurrection and Paul is getting ready to address a church gone wild. He's getting ready to talk about some of these things that are rocking the church, but what's interesting is that when Paul writes the letter of one Corinthians, he doesn't start off by telling them what the problem is. He doesn't discuss the issue. He says, I'm about to get to the problem that's rocking the church, but before he ever mentions an issue, before he ever talks about what's causing division, before he ever talks about the pressures internally within the church, Paul says, I've got to establish something with a preface. So a preface normally in a book or a letter introduces the author and then introduces the subject of the letter or movie or letter and Paul says, I'm going to use my preface to introduce myself, but then I've got to establish something.

Before we talk about the problems within the church, I've got to let you know a spoiler that no matter what the issue is, no matter what the problem is, no matter what the division is, no matter what the faction is, no matter how crazy or wild the church has gotten, there is one established fact that cannot be erased, and that is this, anyone who is a part of the body of Christ who has been drawn into the Nia, the fellowship, the church. Here's the fact. No matter what you face, God will sustain you to the end. Now, if you're waiting for me to get to my point, I just got there. If you don't hear nothing else, you got to hear this. No matter what you're going through, no matter what you're facing, no matter who's against you, no matter who's for you, no matter how much money you are losing, no matter what the business is doing, God will sustain you. Here's the thing. In life you are going to have ebbs and flows. Life is not going to be plastic. Life is not just going to be a series of being on mountaintops. Anybody know that when you join the church, you join a army and this happens to be an army that is engaged in warfare, you're not always going to be on the mountaintop. In fact, Jesus made this promise. He said, listen, in this life you will have trouble. How about that For an invitation to join the body of Christ.

Listen, if you've never had trouble in your life, become a Christian because the fact is that once you become a Christian, you become a threat to the kingdom of darkness. Before you were a Christian, you were in the kingdom of darkness. Satan wasn't going to trouble you, but as soon as you gave your life to Christ, how many know that you can have mountaintop experiences and then it seems like the next day you duck As anybody beside me, you walk out of here, you walking on cloud nine, your feet ain't even touching the ground. Wow, God is amazing. Then Monday, it's like Satan just been waiting with a door open for you to go ahead and try to walk on through this and see what happens. Here's the thing, you're not always going to have mountaintop experiences. Listen to what Paul said, second Timothy chapter three, verse nine, but understand this, that in the last days, we are right now living in the last days ever since Jesus ascended, we've been living in the last days that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. Yay. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, un appeasable, slanderous without self-control, brutal, not loving, good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with the seat. We talked about that man, you look swo

Lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God having the appearance of godliness but denying his power avoid such people. For among them are those who creep into houses and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, always learning and never able to arrive at the knowledge of the truth. Woo, just as Janice and jams opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth. Men corrupted in mine and disqualified regarding the faith. He's not talking about people who were not believers. He's talking about people who were opposing to be in ministry, but they will not get very far for their folly will be plain to all, as was that of those two men. Can I tell you, you will have mountaintop experiences. You will experience the euphoric feeling of being in the kingdom of God, but don't get used to it. A preacher was asked one time how his church was doing. He said, man, we're growing by leaps and bounds, and he said, well, man, what's your growth strategy? Man? We got to know. He said, well, sometimes we're leaping and sometimes we're bound.

Isn't that the truth about your own life? Sometimes you feel like leaping and sometimes you feel like you're bound. Here's the thing, Paul was not afraid of letting us know that there are going to be ebbs and flows in your life. Can I say it this way? Mountaintops are small and the air is thin for a reason. You're not supposed to dwell on top of the mountain, it's rented space. Don't get too comfortable on mountaintops. You're going to have to come down because the air is thin. You cannot sustain a life on mountaintops. The reality is that your life is going to have flux, but the flux is only a reality to humanity because God is never caught off guard. Y'all remember COVID-19, we had double masks on gloves avoiding everybody. Do you think that that caught God by surprise? No. Do you think that God, when we got the news that we have viruses, did you think that God was like, I did not see this coming? No. God was still in control. Do you think the trouble in your life is catching God by surprise? No. Why? Because he's omniscient, which means that he knows all things before things even happen. God knows all things. The question is not whether or not God is in control. The question is, do you believe

That he's in control? The question is not whether or not he is God. The question is do you believe that he is God? The question is not whether or not he's in control. The question is, is he in control of your life? Some of y'all have given your life control to yourself or somebody else, but if you give your life control to God, God will sustain you. The reason why some of us don't feel like we're going to make it is because we're holding onto the wrong stuff. You are holding onto your money. Money will run out. If you're holding on to family members, they may let you down. If you're holding onto your friends, they're going to find some other friends. If you're holding onto your car, it's finally going to start leaking oil. There's only one that will sustain you, and his name is Jesus. Do I have two or three people that will testify to the fact that God will sustain? Has anybody ever been through hell and God sustained you? Has anybody ever lost a job but God sustained you? Has anybody ever gone through sickness in your body but God sustained?

Am I preaching to anybody that has ever gone through a trial but you know that you're here because God sustained me?

Let me tell you something. The question is what do you do when you're faced with trials? What do you do when the church has gone wild? What do you do when things are coming at you that you don't understand? What do you do when you've been praying for something and the prayer hasn't been answered yet? What do you do when you've been fasting but you're just starving? Nothing happening. Is it just me or has anybody ever gone through a fast and been like, I'm just hungry. I ain't got an answer. I'm just, I need a burger. I need to do something. Has anybody ever been there where you are like, well, they told me to pray and I prayed, but it hadn't happened. They told me to study. I studied, but it still had to happen. Have you ever been there or am I by myself? What do you do in a culture of compromise? I'm not talking about the world. I'm talking about within the church. What do you do when you are a part of a global body which was instituted by God? The church is going to always be crazy. You know why? Because it's full of people and people are crazy, and if you're wondering who those people are,

It's you and me, but what do you do when you're dealing with this? This is what Paul said in Ephesians chapter six, verse 13. Therefore, take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand in the evil day and having done all to stand firm stand. Therefore, what do you do when you're dealing with pressure in your life? You got to learn how to just stand firm. The devil is after you. That's a spoiler alert for something. The devil is after you. He does not want you to win. The devil has been after the church since its inception. He's been after the people of God to try to break you down because Satan knows that if he can break you down, he breaks a part of the body of Christ. That's why it's important for everybody in the body of Christ to be spiritually healthy. Why? Because as the members are, so is the body, so this is what Satan does. He uses strategies against you to weaken your faith, but here's the cool thing about God. The scripture says that we are not ignorant. That means devoid of understanding concerning the schemes of the enemy. In other words, Satan has some schemes that he's using against you and guess what? They have been revealed through the word of God. Now, imagine this. Imagine that you're in a battle.

The two sides, you are on one side, the enemy's on the other side, and somehow you got an invisibility cloak. If you don't know what an invisibility cloak is, it's a cloak that makes you invisible. You somehow got access

Into the war room of the enemy, and there they're discussing how they're going to attack your life and we're going to flank 'em from the right. Then we're going to bring in the horses, then we're going to do the fiery arrows and we're going to come at 'em and you just want to make it practical. We're going to come after them with lust, we're going to hit 'em with disappointment. We're going to smack 'em with a bad report. We're going to attack 'em this way and attack away. So you got all the schemes, you get all the information from the enemy. How silly would it be for you to get back to your side and say, man, what am I supposed to do? You've been given the blueprint. When you're given the blueprint. Here's how you defeat the enemy. You do the very opposite of what he has planned, and yet how many of us as believers keep getting tricked by the enemy schemes that we are aware of? So lemme tell you three things, three ways that the enemy weakens your faith. Number one is through disappointment.

Lemme let me go to Mark chapter nine, verse number 17 because I need you to get this before we land this plane. I need you to get this because here's the thing, you got to be aware of the fact that Satan's coming after you. You got to be aware of the fact that he is attacking the church and he uses the same strategy. Number one, it's through disappointment. Let's look at this story in Mark chapter nine. Jesus has just been with his disciples. He has descended from the mountain. He tells the disciples, yo, I've just revealed to you the Mount of Transfiguration and we're going to start healing people and all this stuff, but don't tell anybody this secret. They're walking on cloud nine, they're coming down, they're working miracles. Mark chapter nine, verse number 17, and someone from the crowd answered Him, teacher I brought my son to you for he has a spirit that makes him mute and whenever it seizes him, it throws him down and he foams and grinds his teeth and becomes rigid. So I ask your disciples to cast it out and they were not able to. Now here's the question. Did this man have faith? Yes. Why? Because he brought his son who had an issue to the disciples. He came with faith. He came believing. He came full of hope. He came and said,

Jesus is able because I've seen him do it before. Now the question is, can y'all just pray for my son so this healing can take place? And you know the disciples being on cloud nine, having seen miracles before they were probably being extra. Okay, what's he got? Alright. Hey, extra virgin olive oil. Y'all know what we do? Don't give me that regular. Don't give me canola oil, peanut oil. Give me that extra virgin olive oil. Let me dab them up. Pray for 'em. Jesus name. Nothing happens. Yo Peter, you got this one dog. You walked on water. Remember Peter goes, I got you. I'm going to hit him with the cross. Nothing happens. Now, it's one thing to have faith and believe that God is able. It's another thing when you come to the altar and you pray, you go through all the process and the answer is no, and for many people we will pray for a miracle, and when the miracle doesn't happen, we deal with such disappointment that we just walk away. Here's what's interesting about this man. He got a no and he wasn't about to settle for a no, so he goes to Jesus. He said, man, I've been dealing with the scrubs.

I need to go to the source because the scripture says that someone from the crowd, so while Jesus was teaching, somebody stepped up and said, Hey listen, I got an issue. Customer service, I tried to get a healing. I prayed about it. I've got the faith. I asked your disciples, I went through the process but how I'm dealing with disappointment, and he could have walked away, but something within him said, you know what? If Jesus did it for this guy, I know that he's able to do it for me. I may just need to take it up a notch. So he goes to Jesus and says, Jesus, I'm asking you to come through for me. I'm dealing with disappointment. How many of us give up too soon because we're holding on to the wrong stuff? You're holding on to process instead of the promise keeper, you are trying to go through the motions. Instead of calling on the master, you are trying to go through all this stuff instead of realizing that he who is able to do exceedingly abundantly is available to you. So the enemy's going to try to commit you with disappointment. He wants to convince you that God is not able.

Well, I think he's obviously able for somebody else, but he ain't going to come through for me. Do you know what kind of faith you need? You need the kind of faith that the three Hebrew boys had. Them dudes were about to get thrown into a fiery furnace, which was turned up seven times and they still looked at the king and said, you can throw us in and even if he don't come through, you're going to throw me in the fire with me telling you that I know that. I know that. I know that. I know that he's able. Why? Because I've seen him do too much for me to deny his ability. I've seen it with my own eyes. The reason why I can't give up on God is because I've seen God come through too many times. The reason why I can't quit and throw in the towel, even though sometimes I've felt like it is because I've seen him come through too many times, some of y'all have been wanting to get pregnant for a while and it hadn't happened. I'm telling you, keep trying because God is able, I dunno who I'm talking to.

Keep trying because God is able to do it. Somebody's faith needs to come up in the excitement level and go, you know what? No matter if it doesn't happen right now, I know that God is able. Can I tell you, the enemy doesn't know what to do with a church that believes that God is able, even though they're going through disappointment. Did you know that the enemy doesn't know what to do with you when you come in here and worship even though you're going through a trial, even though your marriage is on the rocks, even though your kids are acting crazy and your money's acting funny and you're still coming in here worshiping God not based on where you are in life, not based on what you have, but based on the fact that he is who he said he is. And if he said He will do it, then he will do it. So he's going to try to get you with disappointment. The reason why Satan attacks the church is because when you put your faith too much in a person and that person falls, he's trying to hit you with disappointment, guess what? It's happened to me and I had to reroute my source.

Second way that he tries to get your faith is through discouragement. Let's continue in the story of Mark chapter nine, verse number 21, and Jesus asked the Father, how long has this been happening to him? And he said, from childhood, this gives an indication that this has been happening for a while. It's one thing to just be disappointed. It's another thing to deal with continued disappointment that turns into discouragement. There are some people in here, you've been praying about the same situation for a while and you have an opportunity to be discouraged that God hadn't come through for you and too many people, they give up in the process of discouragement because it hasn't yet. You know what? The antidote to discouragement is? Encouragement, and the first person you need to encourage is yourself. The scripture says, encourage yourself in the Lord. There are times in my life when I'm going through discouragement that I will go in the bathroom and I will look myself in the mirror and I will say, Tim Rivers, Dr. Tim Rivers.

That's how I started encouraging myself. Dr. Tim Rivers, listen up. You are the head of not to tell, not because you're great, but because you serve a great God. You are above and not beneath. You are going to be the lender and not the borrower. You are going to make it through. Why? Because God is the one who will sustain you. I can't sustain myself. I tried it. It don't work, but I serve a God. So some of you may be going through discouragement. Here's the third way that Satan tries to get you. He tries to get you with doubt. If he can't get you with disappointment, he'll try to get you with discouragement. If he can't get you with discouragement, he'll try to get you with doubt. Mark chapter nine, verse number 23. The story continues, and Jesus said to him, if you can, Jesus sometimes does the oddest things if you can, all things are possible to him who believes It's interesting. Did this man believe? Yes. Now, Jesus, why would I be here if I didn't believe that this was possible? Have you ever been through a hard time in season and somebody says, someone like myself says, I want the altar team to come down here, whatever's going on in your life, come down here and get prayer, and you come down and that person says, if you just believe and you're like, why do you think I'm down here?

Has anybody ever thought that you can be modest if you want, but there were times when I've told somebody about a situation I'm going through and they're like, listen, all you got to do is have more faith. And I'm like, how much more faith do I need? I done gave all my faith and it hadn't happened yet. So my question is what else do I need to add on to it? But here's the thing. Jesus gives a rhetorical question. He knows that this man believes, but he needs him to admit something else and this is what he says. Immediately the father of the child cried out and said, I believe, but help my unbelief. The most human response recorded in scripture is this man admitting that even though I believe that God is able, even though I know that he can do it, even though I've seen him do it for others, there's a tinge in my humanity that still wonders and doubts if it's going to come through for me. Can I tell you, don't let Satan rob you of your faith in God because you have a little bit of doubt. Can I tell you that doubt is proof of faith?

The presence of doubt is proof that you actually have faith. If you didn't doubt, it means that you think that you can make it on your own, but in every season when God's trying to take me up to another level, I'm almost like, God, I know that you're able, but I don't know how you're going to do it. I don't know when you're going to do it. I don't know. And if Satan can get you to doubt, to the point to where you doubt the abilities of God, he's got you, but let me flip the script on you. Every scheme that the enemy tries against you will not work. You know why? Because there's one fact that remains. God will sustain you not just through this season, not just through this trial, but he will sustain you to the end. The only thing you got to do is you got to learn how to hold on to the fact that God is who he says he is.

If there's one fact that remains throughout all eternity is that whatever God starts, he is going to finish. If God gave me a promise, it's not up to me to fulfill it. It's up to me to just hold on to the promise that God gave me and he's going to take me all the way. I'm here to preach and tell somebody, some of y'all are letting go too soon. You got to hold on to the fact that God will do what he said he will do. This is not my church. It's not your church. It's his church, and anything that belongs to God will prosper. Galatians chapter six, verse number nine, and let us not weary of doing good for indu season, we will reap if we do not give up. You can't sustain yourself. You are not smart enough. You don't have enough wisdom.

You don't have enough knowledge, you don't have enough schemes, you don't have enough blueprints. What you need to do is hold on the fact that whatever God said is he's going to do in your life, he is faithful to fulfill it in your life and the best way that you can remember what God is able to do is take a trip down memory lane and remember all the times that he's come through for you before. Is there anybody in this place that could testify to the fact that he has come through for you before? Can I preach and tell somebody that while the church is being rocked and while turbulence is hitting us, remember the fact that God has sustained you Before when I feel like I'm about to give up, I just got to take a trip down memory lane and remember that several years ago, I didn't think I was going to make it, but God sustained me through some trials and tribulations.

When friends walked away, he became my friend. When I didn't have anybody to represent me, he became my lawyer. When I didn't have something to eat, he became my bread. When I was thirsty, he became my water. When I didn't have a place to lay my head, he became my bed. When I was comfortless, he became my comforter. When I didn't feel like I had any help, he became my helper. When I thought my mind was messed up, he became my deliverer. When my body was wracked in pain, he became my healer. When I thought that I was going to lose everything, he became my provider and the fact that I can remember what God has done in my life, if he sustained me before, I wish two or three people would just give God some praise for the fact that he sustained you before now to him who is able to keep you from falling. The greatest promise that you have is that as long as you're holding on to Jesus, you will not fall. Micah, where are you at, bro? Micah. Micah. Micah. Micah. Micah. Micah, Micah. Micah. Micah's coming up. Lemme tell you what sustained means. Sustained means keep something from falling

E flat. Give me E flat cord.

Just hold it.

Just hold it. As long as he keeps his fingers on it, it's not going to fall because he's sustaining E flat. I asked him to keep me in E flat. He's going to hold it no matter what's going on around, no matter what you do, no matter what, see, no, no, you stay in E flat. He's not like God. You know God will keep you an efl. He's an efl. No matter what happens over here, he's sustaining E-flat. Why? Because as long as his fingers are on it, it's not going to drop. Some of y'all need to realize that the hand of God is on you, and as long as the hand of God is on you, you'll always be sustained. Here's the fact. Here's the fact of life. No matter how much you fall or stumble, as long as you, you're in the hands of God, God will sustain you. Even when I drip, he sustains me. Even if I'm the one causing issues, God will sustain me. I am trying to give you a visual of what your life is. As long as you're in the hands of God, no hell, no high water, no trouble, no issues,

God will sustain you. The reason you may feel like you're not being sustained is you may be holding on to the wrong stuff. You may be holding on to a person. That person's going to let you down. You may be holding on to material things, material things will fade away. You may be holding on to money. Money will be spent. You may be holding on to treasures and there's nothing wrong with those things, but don't find your identity in a church sign. You got to now. I'm just having fun. But you notice how he got closer. Here's the thing about God. The more you depend on him, the closer he gets I, until you can finally just rest, you can just rest on him. Somebody shall rest. Somebody say, God will sustain me, and if you believe it, give God 10 seconds of praise in this

Place.

Stop leaning in on people for your eternity. Stop waiting on people and things and no, the only thing that will keep you sustained through life is Jesus Christ. It's no accident.

Why are you preaching this breath? Because as we go through this series and we talk about some issues that the church is facing, they're going to be real issues. You're going to feel Paul said, before I even talk about what's bothering y'all, I got to establish this fact. All this stuff ain't going to change the fact that God is the one that called you into the coin in the eye, into the fellowship of His Son, into the body of Christ. You didn't just decide to be God drew you and God is faithful that if he drew you into the body of Christ, he's going to sustain you. It's not how much Bible you read. Read the Bible. It's not how much you pray, pray. It's not how much you fast, fast. It's not how much you give give. The only thing that's going to sustain you is Jesus. It's no accident that when Paul opens up the letter of First Corinthians, he mentions Jesus nine times in the first nine verses because before he talks about the church gone wild and all the issues that it's facing, he wants you to understand is only Christ Jesus that will sustain you. I cannot sustain nobody.

Come on now. I can hold some people up for a while. Then my arms get sore. Eventually I'm going to drop you. If you lean on Jesus, he'll never drop you. It may feel like sometimes you're like this. That's a lot of muscle. Sometimes it's going to feel like you're close to the ground, but he'll never drop you. Some of y'all have been rocked. You've been rocked and you feel like what is going on. Some of y'all have been through several churches that things have happened in that has caused you to question the church, the koinonia, but lemme tell you what binds us together is Christ. We wouldn't be a church without one thein, the fellowship with Christ. What makes you and I, brothers and sisters is our shared mutual faith in Christ. So what do you do when you feel like giving up? You feel like giving in. You feel like your world is rocked. You hold on to Jesus. You hold on to Jesus. Don't worry about all the other stuff. You hold on to Jesus. If you feel like your world is being rocked. Let me ask you this. Are you holding on to Jesus? Is he your main source? He's the only one that can sustain you through trials and tribulations and hard times. He's the only one.

That's why I'm yelling and screaming. I want this to be your anthem for the rest of your life. When I'm going through a hard time, if I hold on to Christ, he can sustain me. Every head bow, every your eye closed, everybody standing in this place. Some of y'all been wondering, man, how am I going to make it through? I feel like my world is spinning out of control. I got spiritual vertigo. O oh, it's this fact right here. Jesus is the only one

That will sustain you. He'll sustain your marriage when you feel like it's breaking apart, he'll sustain your children when they look like they're walking away. He'll sustain you even when you're dealing with chemotherapy. He will sustain you when you're dealing trauma from your past. He will sustain you. When you're dealing with doubts and confusion about the kingdom of God, he will sustain you. When your faith in God is being questioned, he will sustain you. When you feel like friends are walking away, he will sustain you. When you feel like your whole world has imploded, he will sustain you. Only he will sustain you. Only he will sustain you. Dear Lord, I just thank you for keeping us in your hand. Jesus, you said, those whom the Father have put in my hand, our will and know wise lose. They shall not be plugged from my hand. There is a promise that you will sustain us there. The end, the end is when you return and we are going to be kept. Until you will sustain us, you will keep us from falling. He who has begun a good work is faithful to perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. We are so thankful for that Lord.

Now, there may be somebody in this place that you don't have a relationship with Jesus. Maybe this is your first time here or maybe you've been coming around the church and you know that there's something tugging at your heart and you don't know how to respond to it. Well, let me tell you. That is the Lord and he's drawing you into his fellowship and it's simply a commitment. It's nothing that you have to do. It's something that you receive. It's by grace through faith that we are saved, not of our own works. It is a free gift of God, and so if you have not received that gift, the gift of salvation, then I encourage you to pray this prayer with me. If you're in this place and you're ready to make that step, just say this for me. Say, dear Jesus, I acknowledge my need for you. I believe that you came, that you died, that you rose again. You did it all for me. Forgive me of my sins. Wash me. Come into my heart and be the Lord of my life. I commit to being your disciple. Thank you Jesus for hearing my prayer.

In Jesus' name, amen. Somebody put your hands together.