I just want to mention something and we'll go right into prayer.
And that's Romans chapter one.
Thank you for your presence here.
Thank you, Lord, for your presence here.
Thank you, Lord, for your presence in this house we choose to honor.
We choose to make weighty our praise
and the laying down of our life for you.
Thank you for all the wonderful things you've already done.
Thank you for how you're going to seal inside of us this morning.
All those concepts and precepts and commands
as we grow line upon line, precept upon precept,
you're showing us the kingdom.
And we're so thankful for that, Lord God.
It's just something simple.
The Lord wants me to mention.
And that's Romans chapter one, verse 18.
He just gets done talking about the gospel
and how faith leads to different things.
And you can go back and read the beginning part of the chapter.
Then he says, for God does not overlook sin.
And the wrath of God, this verse 18, is revealed from heaven
against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men
who in their wickedness suppress and stifle the truth.
So sometimes as Christians, what we do is we label sins
that are ranked. We rank them.
If someone swears that while that's down here,
someone does that next thing, drugs or something,
then they're really into it.
And really what he's saying is anything that's opposite
of the kingdom, ungodliness and unrighteousness,
will be that thing that causes us to suppress and stifle the truth.
Because that which is known about God is evidence within them.
So if we know something about God, like we said last night,
once you know, you can't not know.
And we know that in our inner consciousness,
God is made evident to us.
So when he's made evident to us,
then there's that spot like once you know, right?
You're held accountable for what you know.
Forever since the creation of the world,
his invisible attributes, his eternal power and divine nature,
have been clearly seen being understood through his workmanship,
all his creation, the wonderful things that he has made,
so that they will, they who fail to believe and trust in him,
are without excuse and without defense.
Now one version indicates it's more like,
even by nature you can see that there is a God.
And once you know that, you know that.
So whatever you know, you're held accountable for.
But the point of this is not,
he'll go on in the chapter and name all kinds of sins,
but at the same time the point of this is what starts everything,
going down a road of being opposite of the kingdom is unbelief.
For even though they knew God as the Creator,
they did not honor him as God,
or give thanks for his wondrous creation.
On the contrary, they became worthless in their thinking,
godless with pointless reason and silly speculations,
and their foolish hearts were darkened,
claiming to be wise they were fools.
That sounds like America right now.
And exchange the glory and the majesty and excellence
of the immortal God for an image or worthless idols.
And that's why, you know, when everything broke up,
you know, in front of the Capitol and everything,
during 2020 through 2023,
just people were popping up idols.
Things were coming out.
It talks about the different kinds of idols.
Verse 24 says,
Therefore God gave them over to the lusts of their own heart.
And he goes on and talks about several times.
It says, God gave them over.
He didn't give up on them.
He just let them go where they intended to go to begin with.
Didn't put any stoppers to that, right?
And he'll do the same with us.
It's like, if we know something and we do the opposite
and we know something, it's not just,
oh, I failed at this or I tried
and I got to get back up again and try again.
There's an unbelief that says, I know, I know this,
but I'm going to do my own thing, right?
And so verse 28, after he names what happens
when he gives them over,
and since they did not see fit to acknowledge God
and consider him worth knowing as their creator,
God gave them over to a depraved mind
to do things which are improper and repulsive.
So with everything that we've gone through this week
and belief for, it seems like,
well, that's kind of an interesting scripture to bring up,
but I want to bring up that we experienced some things here
and for a lot of us, it was for the first time this week.
And then once you know, you can't not know.
And so what happens is we're held accountable to that.
We don't have to repeat everything that happened through this week
or, you know, praise just like we did this week
or anything, but once you've been exposed to deeper ways
of worshiping God and things like that,
we shouldn't just go back to what we would call the norm
because to do that, we'd actually have to go back
and say, well, that was good and I believed it in the moment,
but now I believe this more.
See, unbelief will take us into depraved things.
So it's not that, you know, people are just born wicked
and that's why we got a world like we have.
There is enough known about God
that people have made a choice to say,
even if that is true, even if I was raised at whatever,
I'm going to go over here and believe this.
And so they've been given over.
So much of our land has been given over
to this depraved way of thinking.
Revival is going to bring alive faith, which is belief.
It's going to cause us to face the things
that are so the kingdom of heaven
and then we have to be able to say within our hearts,
that's true.
That's what I'm going to do because that's what I experienced.
This is how I believe and come up into it,
which means in this same chapter,
it talks about being ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Last night, there was dance like we've never had dance here before.
There was different things.
And you can get up the next day for a lot of people,
they'll get up the next day and be like,
whoa, that was intense.
That was that unique thing that happened or whatever.
But if you're not careful, you can in your flesh
go back and retract the importance
of how intense that really was.
How eye-opening that really was.
How free that really was.
Amen.
And so we have to look at
what does it mean to be ashamed of the gospel?
You know, speaking in tongues and different things like this.
There'll be people that, you know,
talk about our services.
We're going to place certain things online
that probably, you know, others would say,
they don't do that.
They'll make you guys look crazy.
It's like, it's the kingdom of heaven.
Manifesting here in the kingdom of earth
and we're not ashamed of it.
There's used wisdom,
but at the same time,
we're not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
The good news, the way that the kingdom works.
And I think, going way back to last week
where Pastor Brad came in
and talked about intercessory prayer.
I do believe that intercessory prayer
in the way where you reach a point
where it's like groans come out of you.
Like you can't even speak English words
because this thing that he's birthing through you
is so intense.
That is a hard one to explain to the world.
And that's one that, you know,
we're not going to hide out from or anything like that.
But here's the thing.
As we entered that,
that was happening through some of our services.
It happened before the services at prayer meetings and things.
It happened in your own home
for those who are after birthing that next thing in God.
And so, if we retract, for instance,
on the very thing we started with last Sunday,
if we come back and be like,
well, you know, I'll just pray.
We don't have to go to that or whatever.
Then everything we experienced during the week,
in some sense, we're saying,
we're going to step back from that too.
So it started out with the base of what we need
and its intercessory prayer.
Amen?
And we can't be ashamed of that now.
It probably won't happen in Walmart.
Nile 3, where I'm doing that, you know.
There's wisdom, just like speaking tongues.
There's wisdom.
But we have to remember,
he's mapping out this week.
And we're going to do that also.
Map out the week where it's like,
what is it that were the highlights?
Right?
Because this is our mandate,
especially for this year.
This is that thing that's going to take us
to the next steps of where we need to go.
Amen?
And there can't be any shame in it.
Amen?
Because if we're ashamed of the Gospel,
we back off on the Gospel.
And like he said,
you back off far enough.
God will just give us over to a depraved mind.
I mean, that sounds really intense,
but that is the spectrum of how intense it can be.
And why isn't there revival in every house?
And people getting saved and all those different things?
You can tell even by how we label our churches,
levels.
Well, this brand only believes up to here.
Then this brand believes up to here.
Then, well, these guys do this, but they don't do that.
It's the Gospel.
And so this is what gives permission
for Cinder Run rampant in the house.
Because wherever we're in unbelief
of what he can do,
there's a freedom for the demonic realm
to do what they want to do.
Amen?
It's a difference between not knowing something
and knowing it and being like,
now I'm good.
We don't have to do that. Let's stand.
Hallelujah.
This is where it says in the last days,
you know, there'll be a form of godliness.
There'll be people who say,
I know there is a God,
but deny the power thereof.
So to deny the power,
you have to know the power,
but deny that it's God,
which is being ashamed.
It's like, I'm not going to do that.
Father, we thank you.
We thank you.
The other part that brings us into maturity
is
not like we live everyday life,
like last night's service,
but we
experience him
and then we go actually do
the assignment he's given us.
That's a balanced church.
That's a church that says,
I believe, I've experienced,
I've encountered, I go.
I go. I'm going to do the thing
he's asked me to do.