I just want to thank you for the honor of having me up here,
a way to show my bridegroom how much I love him by serving him in this capacity.
It's really an honor to do anything for my bridegroom, from the littlest to the biggest.
And it's just... it's honoring to be called not only his child but his bride.
And I think that we as women have such an honor to experience that in this natural realm.
So before we go in, I really, I really just want to set our eyes on Jesus.
I really want us to look to him because without him, without his presence, we won't be able to receive any of this.
It's going to go in one ear out the other and we're going to walk away and changed.
But with the Lord, when his presence shows up, not only is it tangible, but we walked away, marked, never to be changed again.
Never to go back again, I should say.
So I want all of us to close our eyes.
And I want us to look at the lamb.
And I want us to behold the lamb.
I want us to lock our eyes with the lamb.
What I love to do is I love to picture the cross.
It was the epitome of what Jesus did, who he is, what he did.
It was his goal to be on that cross.
So I like to look at him as if I was Mary kneeling at the foot of the cross.
And looking up at my Savior, who I knew was perfect.
The one who I encountered time and time again.
The one who sought me out in my heartache, in my brokenness, and made me a new creation.
The one who saw what was in my heart and still allowed me to live.
This Jesus who is perfect, he's so beautiful in the way that he speaks.
And the way that he touches.
Looking at the cross as he stretched his self open and blood is willingly being poured out.
Just so that I can know my Father.
So look at him.
Because we won't get anywhere tonight, ladies, if he is not here.
Look at his wounds.
Every time you faltered and fell and churned your back away, he was there with his blood waiting for you.
What an honor to be called his child and his bride.
And though he is seated now, the slain lamb is seated on the throne.
We still get to feel his presence through the Holy Spirit.
Thank you, Heavenly Father, that you brought such poetry through your son.
Such beauty, Holy Spirit, lock our eyes with you, with Jesus, with our Father.
That we're not distracted with the things of this world, the things in our lives.
That as we come into the sanctuary where your presence is.
We can meet our bridegroom.
Jesus, you are a gift.
You are our exceedingly great reward.
Won't you come?
We know you are here, but we ask for a deeper presence.
Trust us with your heart.
Trust us with your glory because we just want to see your glory.
As we cry and we pant for the glory of God.
Won't you come, Holy Spirit?
Open our hearts, focus our minds and veil our eyes to the bridegroom.
Jesus of Nazareth.
Hallelujah, amen. Let it be, Lord.
I tried a new mascara and I think it's not waterproof, so sorry, Lettuce.
Like Hiro was saying, I've had this revelation that the Lord has been speaking to me.
Really, it was the later part of last year into this year.
And it's a revelation that caught my attention because it was everything that I knew
and the Lord flipped it over for me to see the underbelly, the real reason behind it.
And now living in this world with so much social media, so much voices speaking out.
One person saying one thing, the other person saying contradictory to what they're speaking about.
We hear a lot of things happening in our lives, a lot of voices that are coming in.
And so this narrow way, this holy life, God has been showing me this year
and revealing to me what it actually means to live a holy life.
And we're going to touch a little bit about a holy life.
But we're going to more talk about the narrow way.
So this word that I share, I hope it leads you to Jesus because that's the whole point.
Right? It says in the word when Jesus was talking about John, John the Baptist.
And he said, what did you go out in the wilderness to see?
A shaken reed by the wind.
What did you go out to see? A man clothed in soft garments?
But what did you go out to see? A prophet?
Yes, I say to you and more than a prophet.
So that's my question. What did you come here to see?
I want to realign our hearts with the true motive.
What did we really come here to see?
Was it to see Tanya, Pastor Tanya talking?
I don't know.
Was it to fellowship with our friends?
Truly, what did we come here to see?
Or was it the holy God?
Our bridegroom.
Coming and encountering us, undignifying us.
Where we feel like, I don't want to show. There's too many women.
I don't want to reveal myself to the Lord with so many women around.
What did you come here to see?
We're going to start on the Sermon of the Mount.
Matthew 7, 13 and 14.
Enter by the narrow gate.
For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction.
And there are many who go in by it.
Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life.
And there are few who find it.
You know, I love scripture.
Because the more that I read, the more that I see my God, my Father,
and the more I see the beauty of who he is.
He's so poetic.
And I love the Sermon on the Mount recently.
The Lord has been asking me, I've been, okay, maybe he's asking me,
but I've been wanting a desire to memorize the Sermon on the Mount.
The one of the first sermons that the Lord preached here on earth.
And every time I listen to it, because I listen to it,
every time I listen to it,
I just see the beauty of the Lord that much more.
And he's so poetic the way that he structured things out.
So I feel as if the Father poured out
how he intentionally wanted this life he created to look like,
look like through the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes.
It's a kingdom for us to live in with Jesus
as our husband and co-heir and with our heavenly Father.
So if you ever wondered what the kingdom of God was
or the kingdom of heaven, which I often was asking the Lord,
because it's written so much in the New Testament,
I was curious, what is this kingdom?
I believe it's the Sermon on the Mount.
Because it shows us in a very practical way
who's this kingdom, who's kingdom this is, and how do we live it?
What are the bylaws of this kingdom?
How do the people in this kingdom live?
And who is the king of this kingdom?
And how does he rule his kingdom?
So he shares this kingdom and towards the end he switches to a narrow way.
He's concluding his message. Jesus is concluding his message.
And he switches to a narrow way.
And it's interesting because as he's concluding his message,
the next three things he talks about are an extension of the narrow way.
So we're going to read after the narrow way, after what I just wrote,
we're going to read continuing on.
It says, Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing,
but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.
You will know them by their fruit.
And it goes on to talk about a good tree and a bad tree
and how a good tree has good fruit and a bad tree has bad fruit.
And it won't be the other way around.
But it's interesting because he talks about the narrow way.
There's two ways that you can go, two gates and two ways.
And now he's sharing an extension, a deeper understanding of each of these ways.
How will you know if someone's on the narrow gate and a difficult way?
Or how do you know if someone's on the wide gate and Broadway?
Well, you will know them by their fruit because a bad tree can't produce good fruit.
So the next thing he talks about, he says,
not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom of heaven,
but he who does the will of my Father in heaven.
And many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord,
have we not prophesied in your name, cast out demons in your name,
done many wonders in your name, and I will declare to them,
I never knew you.
Depart from me. You who practice lawlessness.
Lord, may that never be us.
To have my bridegroom churn away from me.
And so he tells us what happens if we choose the wide gate and the Broadway
and what it will produce.
It will produce for us to be up there and say, Lord, let us in.
Who are you? You practice lawlessness.
Who did you cast those demons for? Was it for me?
So it's going to tell us what happens to those who choose the wide gate and the Broadway.
Next, it says, Building on the Rock.
Therefore, whoever hears these sayings of mine and does them,
I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock.
The rain descended, the floods came, the wind blew and beat on the house,
and it did not fall for us, found it on the rock.
But anyone who hears these sayings of mine and does not do them,
they have no excuse because they heard it already.
We'll be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand.
The rain descended, the floods came, the winds blew and beat on that house,
and it fell and great was its fall.
So building on the rock tells us the ones who are claiming to know Jesus of Nazareth
will have trials, tribulations, problems and circumstances and situations.
Whether they build it on the sand or whether they build it on the rock,
we're all going to go through that.
And it will cause winds and rains to beat against us.
But how will we stand?
Did we hear what he said?
He said, reading his word and fulfilling his sayings.
Is that what we do?
Or do we choose to do things on our own and live our own life the way we wanted to?
We hear the word.
It's telling us to do what we need to do.
And we're like, yeah, I'll take this one part, but I really want to live my life this way.
I really want to go on this path because it satisfies me.
It's what I desire to do.
So what is this gate and way?
So this is actually a simple life or death decision that the Lord actually spoke about.
He just gave what his kingdom is from the beginning to the end.
He spoke it to the people.
He said, hey, this is my kingdom.
Do you want to be a part of it?
And then at the end, he said, okay, this is either life or death.
You either choose the narrow gate or you choose the wide gate.
He said, I gave you everything that you need to know.
And if you choose to love me, to live in the kingdom of heaven or in the kingdom of God,
you have to follow me and you will have life.
If you do not, there's death.
It's a life and death situation.
It's a matter of salvation.
So let's break down these verses about the narrow gate and the wide gate.
So he from the beginning says, enter by the narrow gate.
It's not a quiz.
He's not like, let me tell you a parable and let's figure out if you know the answer.
No, he's like, hey, before I give the quiz, this is the answer.
Enter through the narrow gate.
And then he breaks it down of why we need to.
Says, wide is the gate and broad is the way.
It also says narrow is the gate and difficult is the way.
So here we see a similarity between two categories.
They both have a gate and they both have a way.
So the gate in the strong's concordance, it says a gate means like a folding entrance.
It's an opening, permitting passage through an enclosure.
It's an opening that's permitting a passage through an enclosure.
So this would represent our decision made in our minds.
And this is the will we decide to choose.
So are we going to accept or choose in our mind, we have a decision.
We're standing between these two gates.
We're standing between the wide gate and we're standing between the narrow gate.
And these gates are going to usher us into a journey of where we are to go.
So if what these gates represent is our decision in our mindset on which direction we choose to go.
Fairly simple.
With the wide gate, it is an easy access.
Of course, it's roomy, it's spacious.
I get to be my own person, right?
I'm not crammed, I don't feel uncomfortable.
I get to do whatever I want, if I want to skip through it, I can.
If I want to twirl, I can. I have space.
It is eye catching.
When you see something tiny and you see something big, your eye tends to gravitate to the big.
Why? Because our eye is part of a sinful nature.
We draw on to the wide way, to the wide gate.
It has a trodden path. There's many that go through it.
In our human mind, it seems like, oh yeah, that seems like the way we should go.
There's many people have gone through it.
Usually if you go in a forest or if you go hiking, I don't do often, but I know some.
Where you go to a hiking and if you see a path, that usually means like, oh, there's a way to get out of this.
Or there's a way I can go in order to get out and enjoy my hike and finish my hike.
So a trodden path we're gravitated to.
There's more people that have gone this way.
And it's more desirable.
I'm sure it's beautiful, a wider gate.
More people are walking through it.
So they add more attention to it.
Right? They dress up this gate.
Look how beautiful.
If you went this way, look how beautiful.
There's beautiful roses on here.
There's vines that are falling down.
You want to go through this gate. It's beautiful.
There's many people who walk through it.
Now with the narrow gate, we have to look for it.
It is hidden.
It is less used and it's not appealing to our eyes.
We actually have to seek out this narrow gate.
And as a human, we don't want to seek anything out.
I want it all given to me.
Come and pamper me.
Come and give me my food.
We don't want to get out of our comfy chairs
and have to seek where this gate is.
I would rather just be ushered in through this wide gate
without getting up from my seat.
And it's interesting because this reminds me of a scene in Finding Nemo
where Nemo and Marlon are obviously going to find Marlon's son Nemo.
Or Dory. Sorry, I said Nemo.
Dory and Marlon are trying to go find Marlon's son Nemo.
And they get to the school of fish.
And the school of fish are trying to tell them the instructions.
And Marlon was in a hurry and he left.
And so Dory, who does not have the memory, is hearing them out.
She actually took the time to hear them out.
And they said, make sure when you get to the valley,
go through the valley, not over the valley.
And so they're swimming and they get to the valley.
And Marlon calls it the valley of death.
Because there's bones all across it. It's dark.
And Marlon's trying to convince Dory to go up.
He's like, look, let's go up. It's light up there.
You're going to love it.
And so then he slowly influences her to go above the valley.
And there is a part of Dory that says, no,
the fish told us to go through.
But he convinces her to go up.
And as soon as they go up, if anyone knows, you know what they find?
A bunch of jellyfish.
And what do those jellyfish almost do to Dory and Marlon?
They almost kill them.
And there's so many fish that is like,
I'm not going through this gate, through this gate.
It's dark. It's dingy. It looks difficult.
Look up there. It's light. Let's go up there.
So they swim up and they get zapped
and killed and their bones go down.
And so it reminds me of that, of the gates.
I love it. Finding Nemo.
So we talked about the gate
and now we're going to talk about the way.
In Strong's, it describes the way as a road,
a progress, or a journey.
It's a passage.
It's a progress on this journey.
And it represents the action of our decision.
So we're standing between these two gates.
One is wide, one is narrow.
Whatever we get to decide,
the way is the action of our decision.
So with the Broadway, it's easier to follow.
It follows our human nature.
It's natural for us to go into the wide gate
or the broad way.
Because it's already Don Trottin, I already said that.
It's probably beautiful. It's wider.
There's more room for you to walk.
With the difficult way,
it's challenging.
It's painful. It's exhausting.
It's going against the grain.
And again, our sinful nature,
our flesh, let's go back to that word.
I like flesh. Our flesh does not want difficult.
We read that and we're like,
difficult.
I'd rather go the other way.
Maybe the Lord will save me there.
No, difficult.
It's painful.
It's exhausting.
It's so challenging to go that way.
And every time you're on that road,
you're like, Lord, why am I here?
I don't want to do this.
I just want to take all of this, throw it away,
and do whatever I want to do.
That's the difficult way.
So what are the outcomes of these ways?
It's interesting.
Because the outcomes are very drastic yet simple.
It's either destruction or life,
and that's what the word says.
It says, why does the gate
brought us the way that leads to destruction?
Plain and simple.
Narrow is the gate,
difficult is the way that leads to life.
So the outcomes are drastic.
It's either life or death.
And we as humans, we don't want that.
Where can I teeter-totter in between?
Right?
So it's interesting because the ending comments
show us a hint to these two drastically different passages
or journeys or ways.
This hint is how many people
will participate on these journeys.
So destruction, it actually says,
it says, leads to destruction,
and there are many who go in by it.
Many will go in
by this way.
They are drawn
into this way.
But then it says,
it says,
the one that which leads to life,
there are few who find it.
And it's interesting because those are two different ways
that the Lord expresses it.
He doesn't say many will go by one,
few will go by the other.
Listen to the way that he explains it.
Many who go in by it
will lead to destruction.
And those who find life,
few who find it.
And so I think we have to pay attention to that.
Obviously we understand looking in this world
being a Christian
and understanding everything that's happening around us
what a broad way is
and what a difficult way is.
And it can be very
very noticeable.
Right?
Like there are certain things that this world portrays
that we should do.
We're like, well, that's white pretending to be,
that's black pretending to be white.
Right?
There's common things that we can see like,
okay, I already know that this is black
even though it's pretending to be white.
But there's also things
that appear to be white
as well in our Christian walk
that the Lord's like, no, no, no, that's black.
And it looks like it's of the way
of the difficult.
But the way that you can
understand the difference
is, is it difficult?
Is that white thing?
Is it difficult?
Is it easier to talk to your friend
about a situation
instead of going to the other person
who caused that situation
and confronting them?
Talking to our friends, I'm just venting.
Hmm.
Is that something that's black
that's trying to look white?
So now we're going to understand
the narrow gate and the difficult way.
Because that's really where we want to go, right?
We don't want to go the broad way.
We don't want to go through the wide gate.
We want to go through the narrow gate
and the difficult way.
And let's hope we all decide this.
So this way of life
is consumed with holiness
and lowliness.
That's the recipe for this way.
It's consumed, consumed.
It's everything
by holiness and lowliness.
And there's a couple of scripture
that talks about that.
In 1 Peter 1.15 and 16 it says,
But as he who called you as holy,
you also be holy in all your conduct.
Because it is written,
Be holy for I am holy.
Leviticus 11.44
For I am the Lord your God,
you shall therefore consecrate yourself
and you shall be holy.
For I am holy.
Leviticus 19.2
Speak to all the congregation
of the children of Israel and say to them,
You shall be holy
for I the Lord your God
am holy.
And consecrate yourself therefore
and be holy for I am the Lord your God.
Leviticus 27.
So holiness
is one of the ingredients
for this way of life.
This difficult way
is holiness.
Holiness
portrays or represents
the actions that we are going to take.
It's the obedience unto the Lord.
What holiness actually is
it's being set apart.
It's being consecrated.
It's being pure.
That's what holiness is.
So you're set apart.
You're taking a step away.
You're consecrated. That means you're sanctified.
That means everything that you are,
you give up because you're going to become pure.
So consecrate.
When you consecrate yourself unto the Lord,
you're giving your rights up to God.
All the rights that you have.
The rights to how you feel.
The rights to how you want to respond.
The rights to what you want to say.
The rights to where you want to go in life.
They're no longer yours. They're the Lord's.
That's what consecration is.
A holy life.
Consecrated unto the Lord.
It's set apart. It's pure.
It's no longer yours.
It's not your own person, your own persona,
or your own person.
It's not your decisions.
It's choosing a life of death.
Because the Lord says those who choose
to deny themselves, who choose death,
will have life.
And those who will choose life
will get death.
And pure to be pure.
You're going to be pure with your language.
And it's even little things.
I tell my boys all the time.
They're boys.
And that should already say a lot.
But they like to talk about poop and farts.
All the time.
I grew up in a household of sisters
and one brother who was so much older than me.
I didn't really spend much time with them.
So it shocked me.
And I'm still shocked.
I'm like, how can you find so much enjoyment
in those words, really?
And so I tell them.
In the beginning, they're little,
and I'm like, okay, let them have their poop
and their farts.
But now that they're older,
I'm like, ugh, like it's hurting my ears.
I've heard enough of it.
Give me a girl.
And so with that,
I've been telling them.
I said, is that a clean word to say?
And my boys are like, no.
I'm like, yeah.
I'm like, if you're choosing to go to the bathroom
and you need to say what you need to say,
that's fine.
But when you're going around walking
and singing poop and fart, poop and fart,
is that really, I know, right?
I'm like, is that really clean though?
And I know that seems so small and tiny
and minuscule.
And they're boys and they're kids.
And I get that.
But I'm training my children to be warriors.
I want them to deal with these minuscule issues
while they're minuscule and tiny.
Because when they get older,
I don't want them to be plagued with poop and fart,
poop and fart.
Which I hope they won't get there.
But I'm dealing with that.
And so it's our language.
What are we speaking?
And it's in my language,
I don't just mean the words that are coming out.
I'm talking about your tone.
There's this thing that I saw
and it's so true to the Midwest.
It was different ways that we say yes and no.
There's like, yeah, no, means no.
And no, yeah, means yeah.
And it's mind-boggling, but we all know it.
We're like, yeah, no, for sure.
We all know it.
But it's our tone.
You can say, yeah, no, I know.
Or you can say, yeah, no.
Our tone distinguishes a lot.
So our language needs to be pure.
What we speak out of our mouths,
even if it's minuscule of not saying poop and fart,
it needs to be pure.
Our intentions for anything that we do need to be pure.
Our intentions with friendships,
with conversations,
with confrontations, thank you.
How are our intentions to things?
Are they pure?
Are they done with the right motive
or is it only benefiting us?
Our conduct has to be pure.
Our response has to be pure.
Our life choices have to be pure.
And how do we know if it's pure?
You take this thing out and you read it.
And it will tell you if you're living a pure life.
I've been talking about purity.
I remember being a teenager
and I already encountered the Lord
and I'm trying to live for him.
He's talking and speaking to me.
And I remember thinking
like when you're hanging out with friends
and they'll say something
and your first thought is
you think of the wrong, negative connotation
of whatever they're saying.
And I remember bringing that before the Lord
and saying, Lord, I don't want to think that way.
I don't want someone to say something
and I'm going to be a little bit more blunt.
I don't want someone to say something
and my first thought is sexual.
Like, that's not pure.
Yeah, it's funny in the moment.
But then I leave and I feel gross.
Like, why did I laugh at that?
How was that funny?
So pure.
Pure...
Sorry, I lost my...
Pure intentions.
Pure serving. How do we serve?
Are we serving purely?
Our deeds.
Are our deeds pure?
Are we doing it to benefit us
or to benefit those around us?
The next part,
so we're consumed by holiness.
Now we're consumed by lowliness.
And we're actually in a series
right now with Pastor Igor
talking about lowliness.
So if you haven't
heard that or have not been on track,
there's ways that you can listen to that
and get an understanding
of what lowliness means.
And lowliness, in this context,
is your attitude.
It's your mindset.
Choosing to be humble
and lowly.
And in Matthew 22,
30...
37 through 40,
it says, Jesus said to them,
you shall love the Lord...
Hold on.
Oh, yeah, let's read it.
Jesus said to them,
you shall love the Lord your God
with all your heart, with all your soul,
with all your mind.
And the second is like it.
You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
Now remember why I wrote that.
Lowliness is your attitude
and it's your mindset.
And for me to captivate
lowliness into one scripture
is that.
How can I be lowly?
I love him with all of my heart,
with all of my soul,
with all of my mind,
with all of my strength.
And then I love somebody else
as if I love myself.
And if you see in both of those
commandments, which Jesus says,
those are the two greatest commandments,
that's what we should be following.
It has nothing to do with us.
I'm gonna love others.
I'm gonna love myself like I like others.
That's not what it says.
It says I will love others as I love myself.
We already love ourselves.
We make ourselves pretty.
We wash our bodies.
We eat the food that we want to eat.
We already love ourselves.
It's easy.
So it means
lowliness means death to self
because in those two commandments
there's nothing about me in there.
It's death to myself.
The bride is getting ready to get married.
In the Slavic culture
it's a very traditional
approach to marriage.
When the woman gets married
to the man, to her bridegroom
everything changes about her.
First of all, her last name changes.
The church that she used to go to
she now leaves it
and goes to the church that her husband goes to.
Their lifestyle changes.
She no longer thinks
about, oh, when can I go shopping?
She thinks about, oh, I need to go home
and make food for my husband.
Everything about
her changes
because she is consumed
by the identity of her husband.
She is to be one with him.
And so that's what a bride is.
She's getting ready to get married.
Everything about who she was
is going to die
and she's going to get a new identity
that she receives from her husband.
That's lowliness.
It's death to self.
So a narrow gate
means a disciplined
life.
What makes something narrow?
So when there are obstacles
standing close about it
that's what it makes it narrow.
If I'm standing right here
I have the podium to my left
the drum set to my right
I have so much room
but in order to
make that narrow
I need to have things
on either side really close to me
in order for me to be in a narrow path.
And when you are on this narrow path
it means it's a disciplined life
because if you're walking this narrow path
and you go slightly to the left
you're going to get pricked
or you're going to fall
or you're going to hurt yourself.
So you're making the greatest intention
of putting one foot in front of the other
not going to the left or to the right
because it's narrow.
You have nowhere else to go.
You're choosing to be
disciplined in that path
in that way.
So if you see a hoarder's house
there's a TV show hoarders
and I'm sure everyone understands that
there's always a small pathway
through their house
and sometimes it's so dangerous
because as you're walking
there could be things that topple over
on top of you.
And why?
Because there's things on each side
that are restricting it from becoming bigger.
They have too many things
in order for it to make the
way bigger.
So disciplining means
disciplining every part of your life
that's what the narrow way.
It's disciplining every part of your life.
Your mind, your heart,
your actions, your words,
your body, your schedule.
You're doing things
for the glory of God.
You wake up in the morning
and you don't think about,
oh I'm so hungry, what do I want to eat?
No, you wake up in the morning,
Lord you are so good,
I'm going to live this day for you.
Now he's so gracious and kind
and he allows us to make certain choices.
It's not just one dish
where you go and you restrict
everything from yourself.
The Lord is gracious. He desires us
to live this life with him
and join things.
But it's a
disciplined life.
God, you told me to take care of my body.
Not even
eating after seven.
Lord, you told me
to share your gospel.
Everyone I come to,
hey Jesus loves you.
It's a disciplined life.
Not how you feel, not what you want to do.
Your intention
is always on him.
Making sure
that you are balancing on this
and not going on one dish to the other.
Because we humans, we will.
We'll take it and we'll go completely restrictive.
I'm doing nothing
from myself, which is good.
But I'm only going to live this way.
And you go on
one dish.
And then there's the other dish where grace.
The Lord loves me.
I can do anything.
He's always okay with me.
And Pastor Verne
preached this series last year
of a balanced Christian life
or a balanced life of a Christian.
And we can only
achieve this balanced life
of disciplined
a disciplined way
in a gracious way
by the help of the Holy Spirit
and the
counsel of the Holy Spirit.
He counsels us.
He gives us advice.
And he helps us to make the right decisions.
Figuring out
what do I need to discipline
in my life.
Right?
If you have a healthy body
and you're focusing on trying to discipline
your body even more to the point
where you're actually damaging your body
that's not the type of discipline
he's talking about. That's an unbalanced life.
So we can only achieve this
with the help of the Holy Spirit.
And that's why daily fellowship
and word time and intimacy
with him is important.
Because you won't know the counsel
of the Holy Spirit. You won't know
his help unless you spend time
with him to hear his voice
to feel his direction.
It's choosing
a narrow mindset
or a narrow decision to choose
the difficult road
to be focused.
So that's the narrow gate.
Now the difficult way
it's kind of self-explanatory, right?
It's difficult.
When things are difficult
that means we're growing.
When we're looking
at our kids and our babies
are teething
and they're clingy and they're crying
and they're in pain and it's
difficult.
Yeah, our heart
goes out. I'm so sorry.
But you're going to get teeth.
And you get to bite things
with those teeth.
You're growing. You're getting
milestones.
If we see a toddler trying to
walk and they're slowly getting
up and they're starting to move
and they take a step and then they fall down
and they hit their head.
That's difficult. That's painful.
Right?
But we know
that will help them
to grow to walk.
So they're growing.
With children, when they have
growing pains in their legs
or in their back, it's difficult.
Thank God for medicine.
But it's difficult. It's hard.
They don't like it. We don't like it. Nobody sleeps.
But the beauty
is that they're growing. They're
getting taller.
When we have hard
work
what does that produce?
Character in our lives.
It's hard. We don't want to do
hard work.
We don't want to get our hands dirty.
We don't want to get on our knees. We don't want to sweat.
I want to sit on the couch
with a nice drink
with Eric AC on and watch TV.
That's what I want to do.
But I'm not going to grow. I'm not going to build character.
I'm going to be lazy.
Having loss
in your life.
Losing a loved one.
Losing a child.
Losing a friend.
Whether it means physically
or relationally.
It's hard.
And it's difficult.
But then you value
friendships. You value
children. You value
your parent.
Because you understand when you go
through loss
I'm not going to do what I did before.
Disappointment.
Disappointment is difficult
when someone rebukes you.
When someone
says they're going to do something
and they don't show up. It's difficult.
There's pain
to that.
But then it also builds integrity.
Well, I hated that when they told me
they were going to be there
and they did not fulfill time and time again
I'm going to do the opposite.
I'm going to be a person of integrity.
If I say I'm going to do it I'm going to do it.
So
difficult road
as hard as it is
especially in our kids. When we see our kids
going through something difficult and we don't want them to
I know it's
actually for their benefit.
So human nature
says that difficult
is bad. But God's
word says difficult leads
to life.
Compared to a child who gets everything
that they want
and the child who doesn't get
much of what they want.
And I feel like I'm living that now.
Because I come from an immigrant family.
Now granted, I was spoiled
and I will
confess to that. I was spoiled
as a kid. I definitely got
way more gifts than any of my friends did.
But I did come from
an immigrant family and I tasted
what it means to have a difficult life.
Not having enough money
not having enough finances
not having enough opportunities
because we just didn't
have time for that. That was not
the priority in our life.
And so then now seeing my kids
and I'm giving them
the toys that they want
and I'm giving them the candy
at every time we go to the grocery store
and I'm giving them the things that
I wish I would have gotten
as when I was little for my parents
and
this is not turning out well.
My kids are spoiled.
They're expecting certain things
and though I'm giving it
out of the goodness of my heart
I want them to have good gifts.
I'm starting to realize now
this is not the way
it needs to be difficult.
And I am a no mom
I love saying no to my kids.
I'll even sing it. We'll be at the store
and mom can I know
like it's my favorite word.
I love the no word.
So denying yourself
or death to self
and I love
death to self something that the Lord
taught me when I had
my first kid and my second kid
and then my third kid.
We as mothers, anyone who is a mother
and who will be a mother and who will be
in the future will be a mother.
You understand firsthand
that we get to experience
death to self
in the most forceful way ever.
And it's awesome.
We hate it, but we love it at the same time.
And it's a lesson
that we are forced to learn
and it's a lesson that I think Jesus
that I'm forced to learn.
Because it's some things that people don't
you won't experience, you won't understand
until you go through that.
So when a child is born
the mother at least for sure
for the first couple of months
is the most
motherhood is the most dominating
identity in her life.
Now she is a wife
and she might be a mother to other
children, but to that child
it's motherhood first.
In a split second
her world is now revolved
around this tiny little infant.
Every thought, every plan,
every action, every strength
she instantly learns
what death to self is.
Even if she tries
to go back and do something that
she did before she became a mother
it's still
and I use this word and I realize it's not good
but it's the only word I can think of
it's still tainted with motherhood.
So I can go
I can have this baby
and I can go get my nails done
guess what I'm thinking the whole entire time
is my baby okay
is he hungry I need to go back
now I can hear him crying
50 miles away I need to go back
it's tainted with motherhood
you can no longer go back to that
person who you used to be
and I understand
now and many women who have told
me who are far seasoned in life
that will never go away
once you're a mother you're a mother forever
it doesn't matter
if they're old
They're still your child. You're a mother. You're always thinking about them. And that's what
death to self is. I am dying to myself, taking the identity of Jesus, and it's all about him.
What does he want? I'm hanging out with these people, but man, Lord, I just want to hear you.
Everything you're thinking about is the Lord. Holiness. So here are some difficult things.
That I have experienced, and I'm sure you have and will, and I will too. Some difficult things on
this difficult way. Confrontation. Admitting that you're wrong. Asking for forgiveness. Dealing with
issues locked in a box in your heart and you deciding not to touch them. That's difficult.
Stumbling and falling and getting back instead of giving in. That's difficult. Being disliked.
Being taken advantage of. That one's a hard one, because the Lord does say if they slap your cheek,
you're not supposed to take a step back and possibly give them your other cheek.
No, you're still in the same place that you were where they slapped your cheek and you give
them your other one. Why? Because the vengeance is the Lord's. He will deal with that later.
Evil people gossiping about you. Evil intent for you. Having unfairness in life. Working out
your body when you just want to rest. Choosing to play with your kids instead of
scrolling on your phone. That's difficult. Obeying your Lord even if he wants you to
start speaking in public places. That one hits hard. Those are difficult. It's hard.
It's difficult, but it's building a woman that the Lord desires for me to be.
So, let's look at some examples of a narrow gate or the difficult road. Matthew 16, 24,
through 25. Okay, there we go. Matthew 16, 24 through 25. It says,
then Jesus said to his disciples, if anyone desires to come after me, let him deny himself
and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it. But whoever
loses his life for my sake will find it. Death to self. I feel like I already talked about this,
but you get where I'm coming from. It's death to your motives. What motivates you in life?
What do you want to accomplish in this life? Die to it. It's gone. Jesus.
Your desires. Oh, I desire some sushi right now. Death to self. Eat at home. It's free. Jesus.
It's not free. Girl math, but you get what I'm saying. Your thoughts. Oh, I'm so frustrated
the way that he talked to me. I just asked him a question and he'd said it to me. Nope.
Death to self. Jesus. Right? Your routine. I want a certain routine. I want to wake up at 10 a.m.
every morning. And I want to eat cereal and then sit on the couch and watch TV.
Your routine. Death to self. Jesus. What does he want me to do? He wants me to take
care of my body. He wants me to take care of my kids. He wants me to teach my kids.
He wants me to manage my household. Goals. Oh, I desire to be a blah, blah, blah, blah. I don't
want to say anything because I don't want to be like, what? Lord said, nope. Cut it out. Jesus.
Death to self. I will tell you what you need. Your rest. He wants you to die to your rest.
Not scrolling on the phone or listening to an audio book or turning on the TV. No. Death to self.
Jesus. The word. Find your rest in him. Read his word and make that your rest.
Your feelings. We women have a lot of them. And it's good because we get to experience
the world through feelings. It's amazing. But we also have a lot of them.
Death to self. I feel annoyed. Death to self. Jesus. I'm going to respond kindly.
So we completely discard our identity and take on the bridegroom's identity. How did Jesus respond to
things? Luke 737 through 838. And behold, a woman in the city who was a sinner.
When she knew that Jesus sat at the table in the Pharisee's house,
brought an alabaster flask of fragrant oil. And she stood at his feet behind him,
weeping. And she began to wash his feet with her tears, wiped them with the hair of her head.
And she kissed his feet and anointed them with fragrant oil.
Loving on Jesus in any time that he beckons us to come to him.
There's been so many times where I wake up in the middle of the night, not by my kids,
because that happens often. And I wake up and I know he's beckoning me to him.
He's calling me to him. Lord, I don't want to. I've already woken up three times this night.
I'm exhausted. I'm not going to have a good day tomorrow. But he pounds. Come love on me.
I'm in pain. I've just seen something that hurts my heart. I've just had someone completely turn
away from me. Come, love on me. Come to his feet and wash and wipe his feet with the tears of our
love, the oil of our heart and the hair of our vulnerability, all while kissing him with affection
that he bought with his blood. Come and love on him when he beckons you.
Not ask for him. Just say, Jesus, I love you. Your blood is enough. Jesus, I'm so sorry that
you're in pain. I'm so sorry that you see all this wickedness. I desire you to come. I want
to love on you. And you kiss him with the affection. He is given the reward that he paid for.
He died on the cross. We have the ability to give him his reward.
Matthew 12. I'm almost done guys, I promise. Matthew 12, 34 through 37.
For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. As a good man out of the good
treasure of his heart brings forth good things. And an evil man out of the evil of his heart
brings forth evil things. Okay, right here. But I say to you that for every idle word,
men may speak. They will give account to it in the day of judgment. For by your words,
you will be justified. And by your words, you will be condemned. This one's a hard one.
Idle means no real worth, no importance or significance. Idle means frivolous and vain.
Idle means meaning less. So we like to talk. We're women. We like to share. We are built
with emotions and feelings. We desire conversation. What are we talking about?
Is it meaningless? Is it tearing someone down? Is it vain? Is it only about us?
Well, the Lord spoke this to me yesterday. Oh, and then, yeah, that happened to me too.
You always bring the conversation back to you. Look what I did. Is your talk idle?
Idle. For out of our heart goes into our mind and from our mind unto our tongue. So we need to talk
about true things, noble things, just things, pure things, lovely things, good things of good
report, virtuous things and praiseworthy things. Our tongue has the power of death and life in
it. The last one, Matthew 18. And this one, the Lord just recently revealed to me and he shared
with me something that he did for me. If your hand causes, if your hand or foot causes you to
sin, cut it off and cast it from you. It is better for you to enter into this life,
maimed, lame and maimed, rather than having two hands or two feet to be cast into the
everlasting fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you.
It is better for you to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes and be cast into
hellfire. There was a couple years ago, the Lord asked me to delete all my social media.
And the main thing, I was spending way too much time on it. It was consuming my day.
I would always be on it. My phone would always be right next to me because I wanted to be on
it. And he asked me, he said, I want you to get rid of it. And he's done this before with me.
And I'm like, okay, Lord, I'll get rid of it. And I got rid of it. And I'm like, okay,
when am I going to get it back? Because he's done it with me before. I've given it away.
And then he's like, yep, you can have it back now. Okay, great. Thank you. So again,
I bring it up and I'm like, okay, Lord, I gave it away. When can I have it back?
Not this time. Take it, cut it off and throw it away because you keep going back to the same vomit
over and over and over again. I would rather have you in heaven with me than thinking you lost
some experience here on earth. FOMO, fear of missing out. It's not worth it. Take that thing,
cut it off, cast it out as if you're never going to get it back.
That was a hard one. Difficult.
So as we walk this path, this path will become more narrow and narrow.
Because when we see Jesus as our outcome, our mind is thinking about Jesus, our life is showing
Jesus. And he asks us to take a step forward. And it's already narrow. He's like, take a step
forward. Okay, Jesus, I'm going to take a step forward on the narrow path. It's getting a little
bit more uncomfortable. There's more things around me. He's like, okay, all these things
that you're carrying on yourself, I want you to get rid of social media. Oh, Lord,
I can't. I interact with my cousins that are far away. I interact with friends that I don't see
anymore. He's like, no, get rid of it. I don't want it. Now, obviously, there's a purpose to it.
And if I don't choose to get rid of that, I won't be able to take the next step because,
guess what? I'm going to get stuck. In order for me to go forward on this narrow path,
that's only getting more narrow to Jesus. Things are going to start falling off. I'm going to be
start taking things off. And soon it's going to be too tight that the only thing I have when I come
to Jesus is Jesus. That's the point of this life. It's not, we've heard this and it won't
register to you unless the Lord reveals it. It's not about the money. It's not about the
the things that we have or the things that we have attained or the fame that we've got or
this person knows that I dress great or this person knows I have a kept house or this person knows
that I cook well. It's not about that. It's not about, oh, this person knows that I spent
time with the Lord. No, it's Jesus. And that's all I want is Jesus. And that's only the only
thing I'm going to get with me when I get into heaven is Jesus. Nothing else is coming with me.
It's my knowledge of him. The beauty of living in this earth, in this world, is that we get
to learn facets of Jesus. And we're going to take that with us when we get to heaven.
So our flesh is going to war with us, guys, or ladies, sorry. Our flesh is going to war
with us. There's going to be some hard, difficult things that the Lord is going to ask
you to get rid of. And for me, it's going to be, I need to get rid of it. Where for someone else
they're like, that makes no sense. Why do you need to get rid of that? The Lord told me. It's between
me and him. So it might not make sense to the people around you, but if the Lord is asking
you, your flesh is going to war. You don't want to. We're going to pout. And sometimes
we said, no Lord, I'm not going to do it. But because of our love for him, we're going to
change our minds and do it. So let's pray. Heavenly Father, I ask that you help us to
choose this way. Help us to understand this way. And if we don't have a full
understanding to walk it anyways, reveal the things in our lives that we need to get rid of
that are a stumbling for us before you, Lord.
Help us to understand what a holy life is and give us counsel and wisdom into how to walk it.
Give us the balance as we seek you out that we may love you with all of our hearts and our mind
and our soul and our strength. And give us the fear of the Lord for it is the beginning of wisdom.
And I thank you, Lord, that you hurt us. I thank you that you were here, Holy Spirit.
I hope you found a pleasing aroma among us, an incense that filled the throne room of God that
made his eyes turn towards us to capture the Father's eye. So Holy Spirit, may this word be a seed
that is planted and then let it die so that it can birth even more fruit in our life.
Show us what it means to deny ourselves
and to choose you. Jesus, you are a bridegroom. You are so beautiful. Your eyes are so passionate.
Your touch is so gentle. And I can't wait to get into heaven and be with my bridegroom.
Create in us a bride that is pure and holy and consecrated. And let us leave tonight with
unveiled eyes completely changed for your glory, Lord. I thank you, Father, that you are so good
to us for your Son, Jesus, who died on the cross. We love you, Heavenly Father, and we pray these
in the name of Jesus so that you, Father, can receive glory through your Son. Hallelujah. Amen.
Thank you, ladies. I'm so sorry for the time.
Wow, that was good. I have just a couple things I want to share with you. So,
there's a phrase that the Lord shared with me a couple years ago that I just want to give to
you. And so, it is no common ground. So, some of you might have known like I was an addiction
and I looked a lot like that Broadway, right? And so, as I began to walk with God, the further
I was walking, as Pastor Tanya was describing, it's like the more narrow, the more you're letting
go of, right? And so, this phrase dropped into my heart, no common ground. And so, there are
things just like Tanya was describing that God will ask you to give up. And it is our love
for Him that leads us into obedience, right? And it's actually the proof of our love. And so,
we are going to take communion. And in this time, we're going to remember one, the sacrifice of
the blood of Jesus that literally enables us to come into His presence, right? So, He bought
us while we were still yet sinners, still covered in all of our own mess, right? And He laid down His
life in obedience for us so that we could be made into His likeness, so that we could actually
be empowered to walk along that way, looking more like Him day in and day out. And that's
why, right? Because we are to be Jesus, multiplied in the earth. And so, I just want to say,
He reminds me of this, and I feel like I am to share it with you. Many years ago, I was a young
lady, and I believed that there was a God. And I remember someone asked me, are you a Christian?
And I said, yes, but I don't live that way. I will never live that down. And it's literally,
it's literally, God is so gracious. He reminds me of that statement because He's like,
do you want to live that way now? Yes. Yes. Yes. Because when I walk into a room and I talk to
someone, and if they turn and they ask me, do you know the maker of heaven and earth? Do you
believe that there is a God? I want the fruit of my life to be a testimony enough. The words
in my mouth to be a testimony enough, right? And so we walk along the narrow way, throwing off
the sinfulness of the past to look more like Jesus so that we can be Jesus to the people around
us, right? Yeah. So no common ground. No common ground. Many of you know Halloween is coming up.
I have had so many questions. What are you doing for Halloween? Do you dress up, blah, blah,
blah? I'm going to touch some buttons, okay? I do not participate in Halloween. Why? My Jesus
doesn't. I don't care if your church down the way has a little trunk or tree or whatever. My Jesus
doesn't. My Jesus doesn't. So I'm sorry, but I don't participate because my Jesus doesn't.
So, and there are people, right? Even in Christian circles that are like, well, that's just kind
of, I'm sorry, honey, that's not religious. That's conviction. No common ground. I don't want
any common ground with the enemy. Why? Because common ground gives them access to my life. Do
I want that? Do you want that? No. My son asked me questions. Mom, I just don't understand why,
just like Tony was saying, God will ask you to give up things that might look ridiculous to
other people, but the truth of the matter is it doesn't matter what they think. It matters
what he thinks. Yeah. So Psalms 25, 14 says the secret counsel of the Lord is for those who fear him.
He will reveal his covenant to them. This is a participation of the covenant of Jesus Christ
to exchange in fullness. How do we exchange? How do we take something upon us, but if we
don't first lay something down? So in this time as we take communion together, I need you.
I need you too. Because I care about each and every one of you. I want each and every one of
you to look at your own heart and say, God, what is it that you want me to let go? Where can I
exchange with you? Where can I exchange with you? What is the thing that is tripping me up,
that is common ground with the enemy? Where can I exchange with you? So we're going to take our
hearts before the Lord and we're going to grab our emblems and then we're going to come and
pray together. Okay, so if we want to have an exchange, we lay it down in repentance.
And it's important that repentance is an aspect of communion because this is a very holy thing.
We do this in remembrance of the body that was broken to cleanse us, to heal us,
the blood that was spilled to clothe us in the righteousness of Jesus. We do these things
remembering the fullness of what was bought and purchased for us.
If you don't know what the fullness is, you need to get up in your word and start looking at the
fullness. There's so much more available to you than many of us live in capacity of. Does that
make sense? Yeah, so let's take communion together. Lord, we thank you for your body
that was broken for us. God, we thank you that you came completely sinless,
that you walked the difficult way, God, in order to purchase for us a relationship with the Father,
to purchase for us redemption, God, to literally clothe us in your righteousness.
God, we thank you for healing our bodies, for delivering us, for giving us the power of the
Holy Spirit that lives and dwells in us, that enable us to walk along this narrow way, God.
And we do this in remembrance of all that you did here on earth and bought and paid for us.
Thank you. We thank you. We praise you. Amen.