In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of holding onto God's word and having a deep relationship with Him. He highlights that many people struggle to grasp and internalize God's word, leading to emptiness and vanity in their thoughts. God desires to be a fountain of living waters for His people, providing sustenance and rest for their spirits and hearts. The preacher also mentions a popular book that addresses the boredom some Christian men feel in church, suggesting that they long for a battle to fight. However, he expresses concern about the author's dissatisfaction in his marriage and ministry, which has influenced his theology.

This message is one of the Times Square Church Pulpit Series. It was recorded in the sanctuary of Times Square Church in Manhattan, New York City. You're welcome to make additional cassettes of this message for free distribution to friends. However, for all other forms of reproduction or electronic transmission, existing copyright laws apply. Praise God. Hallelujah. Welcome to our visitors. And if you're visiting, then you have really no idea how long it's been since I preached in this church. But I believe it, I think it was June or so. Maybe some of you thought I was fired. But it ended up that Pastor Carter and I were able to minister in Latvia and Ireland in June. And I was privileged to go with Pastor Dave to Brazil in July. And then we were gone in August. And then I got the month of September off to write a book. And I really need your prayers. It's a tough go for me. It's really hard for me to get down to it. And I just feel such an opposition. And I think that's a signal that God really wants that book written. And so I'm trusting Him with that. And I ask your prayers for that. But it's going to be written. It's going to be done. And so I'm trusting Him with that. What are you trusting Him for today? Trust is a great word. It's a scary word. It's a very sisting word. But I'm trusting Him for that. If you're visiting with us today through Exit 8 and 9, we have a place for visitors to go. And that you'll be able to get a gift from the church. And we'd love to be able to just meet you firsthand and give you that gift. So if you're visiting with us, you're welcome. I'd like if you would turn with me in the book to Jeremiah in the Old Testament. The book of Jeremiah. And the title of today's message is called, Living in Plan A. Living in Plan A. If you would pray with me. Father, I come in Jesus' name. Lord, I pray for the ability to deliver your heart. God, these are your people. And Lord, I pray that I could disappear. And that Holy Spirit, you would come. And just like a free-flowing fountain, Lord, your thoughts and your heart would wash over us, oh God. And find a lodging place. Lord, I thank you we are a blessed people to be able to live, oh God, in the light of your love, your presence, and your word. Lord, help us, oh God, not to take it for granted. But Lord, help us to live in the privilege that we have in Christ alone. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen and amen. Living in Plan A. When I mean Plan A, many of you know, but for those that don't, that really means living in the first plan, the best plan, the highest plan. Not unlike living and playing on the A team. Where you truly get to be in the, where you have that confidence that what God has called you for, what God has intended for your life, you're living that life. And you know, it was so strong in my heart because the truth is that most of us, no, all of us, at some time get totally convinced that we're living in Plan B. And there are some people that actually end up living their life in Plan B. Where Plan B is substandard, it is lower than God intended. And in some cases, it is so living apart from what He intended for us and what He has for us that we end up actually living under His wrath. That there is this struggle within us because when we come to Christ and we hear that He is our life and that we read these promises in the Bible and we hear that they are for us. And that by faith that the Spirit will quicken and say this is for you if we walk with Christ. And if we begin to say, God, oh God, give me the grace to believe that. Give me the grace to trust that. The enemy rises up. You want to know why? Because the devil lives nothing but Plan B for his life. And worse. The devil's definition is a creature that lives Plan B and lower. You know, when he was standing in the full glory and revelation of God, he blew it big time. When he had everything and he knew everything and he was without excuse except that his pride and except for his beauty and himself rose up higher than what was right. And he chose another path when he was cast from the glory of God and the presence of God. I tell you, there is something I feel in his heart that is full of rage that is fueled with regret and self-loathing. I feel that that creature is so animated by what he has forsaken, not that he could repent or wants to repent. But there is something that is about the enemy that anybody and anything that he can take from the full plan and glory of God. He wants to lower to his level and he wants to keep them there because he is the epitome of Plan B or lower. He's the epitome of a blown life, of a wasted existence. One that abides under the wrath of God. That's who he is and that's what he's about. And he's so full of malice and envy against the children of God. But anything he can do to convince us that we live in Plan B or anything he can do to take us and have us live there, he would do. That would be his delight to do. And, you know, today God has been speaking to me that so many of us live with a fear that, God, I have done something in my life, I have caused something that I feel, I battle all the time, that I'm really missing your best for me. That there are some today that they feel that somehow through a wrong decision, something in the past or something that they're battling with right now and they're not getting victory over, that it is disqualifying them from God's best. There is a cry in your heart, God, have I missed you somewhere? God, am I missing you somewhere? God, you know I want you, I want your will. But if I look to the left and I look to the right, I don't see blessing. I don't see where it's easy. I don't see, I want to know why I seem to have like this low-grade depression, this low-grade fever of living displeasing you. There are some, beloved, that here, and we've all known what it is. That there is a fear that can grip us. That, God, I'm not going to make it. I'm not going to be able to live the way I want to live. And, beloved, there is, we live there. And we, in that lower place, we become very, very vulnerable in our mind. Now, I want to talk about a time. I want to talk about a time when Israel, the chosen of God, truly did live in Plan B. And I want us to look today at what happened to these people when they started living Plan B. When God's incredible plan for them as a nation, as individuals, somehow slipped through their fingers. And something happened in the life of that nation that infected the people of God. That they began to think and move and live in another way that was moving so far from what God had for them. And what God had intended to them that God had to do an incredibly drastic thing. I want to look into their lives, the lives of a people of God that started living in Plan B. And I want to look at somebody in that time that took another path. There was a time when Israel, in a nation that tells us in Jeremiah, it was in Jeremiah's time of prophecy. You see, he lived the last 40 years. His ministry was the last 40 years that the nation of the southern kingdom of Judah was as a people. He prophesied to this group of people. And the end result was that about 600 years before Christ, after hearing... Let me start by saying, he started his ministry under King Josiah. And King Josiah was a good king over the king of Judah, the southern kingdom. But Jeremiah had a word, a warning. And Jeremiah had a word that sounded so full of judgment and wrath on the surface. But he began to speak to a people who were living under a very godly leadership. And he began to speak to them of their heart and how God was saying, I'm seeing right into the center of who you are, and into the center of your thought life, into the center of your battles, into the center of your struggle, and I have a word for you. And it was an incredible word because it was truth. And it was always full at the beginning of endearment and full of love and saying, Turn to me, return to me, I'll restore you. But you see, when the people were living under Josiah was a good time. They had godly leadership. They had a king that loved God with all their heart. And they felt safe, they felt secure. And it's almost like we were living our relationship with God through this man. In other words, we'll know a blessing, this man is a good king. We have godly leadership over us. And having that godly leadership almost allowed a false covering over their heart. Because when the word of God came to them, there was no genuine change in them as individuals. And then when Josiah was taken, and there started to be king after king that lived on a lower level, didn't have the heart for God. All of a sudden the judgments that prophet Jeremiah began to speak about began to be fulfilled. And about 600 years before Christ, under another king, the start of judgment against Judah, the southern kingdom, started. And Babylon invaded Egypt in the year 612 BC. And in the same year later, they invaded Palestine and Jerusalem. And they deported the choicest of youth from among them. And Daniel, the prophet Daniel, was taken with them. And Jeremiah kept prophesying. And ten years later, Babylon came again, swept down into Israel, and again plundered and took people and removed them. And Jeremiah kept speaking God's word to them. And finally, a third time, Babylon came, destroyed the nation, destroyed the temple, took the people, and the southern kingdom ceased to exist. And when Jeremiah began to speak to them, we see in chapter 2, talking to a people who was moving in plan B, he says in verse 7, I brought you into a plentiful land, he's speaking with the Lord's voice to them, into a good country to eat fruit and the goodness thereof. But ye, when ye entered, you defiled my land and made my heritage an abomination. God spoke to them, when I took you out of Egypt, he says in verse 6, and all I did for you, I brought you and rescued you out of Egypt, I delivered you, this is my heart for you, deliverance, I would be God to you and bless you. But it was falling on deaf ears. And he says in verse 5, he says, Thus saith the Lord, what iniquity have your fathers found in me? That they have gone far from me, and they have walked after vanity, and they have become vain. What is your controversy with me? That when I speak to you, your minds and your hearts are full of vanity. It means vain is light and empty things. How is it that you can't hold a word from me? How is it that my heart is light for you? He was saying to these people who were moving into a plan B, where their lives were going to fall so far short of what he had purchased for them, what he was giving them. Why is it that you can't retain what I'm speaking to you and live in the strength and the power of it? And he says to them in verse 9, I will plead with you, he says. Wherefore I will yet plead with you, saith the Lord, and with your children's children will I plead. He says that, be astonished, verse 12, O ye heavens at this, and be horribly afraid, and be very, very desolate, saith the Lord. For my people have committed two evils. They have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and have hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water. And he's saying, be astonished anything, trees, heaven, angels, be astonished if anyone can see what's happening here. He's saying, I have a people and I gathered them from all nations, and I promise to be their God. And he said, what I'm asking of them is they give me their heart and give me their mind, and I will do for them that will be an astonishment through all the earth of what I will do with a people that will acknowledge me as their God. Cry out to me and ask for my ways, ask for my thoughts, ask for me. And he said, I'll make you an astonishment and a praise throughout the whole earth. But he says, look, be very afraid, because for some reason these people can't hold my word. In their thoughts, they're vain and they're empty, and nothing settles and nothing grips. And he said, here's the relationship I had planned, that I would be like to them a fountain of living waters. And a fountain is easy. A fountain bubbles up all the time. It's springing fresh and it's springing new. And he's saying, here are these people that I'm offering them this kind of relationship with me, if they will listen to me and obey me in what they hear. And he says, in other words, instead of this kind of relationship where I spring up in them and I will make them clean, and it will be a living thing. He said, no, what they're choosing is they want to chew out of a rock. They want to carve out of rock a place where water flows into. But everything they set their hand to, it's hard, it's strenuous. It's like they've got this thought. Now here is how we please the living God. It is nothing but hard work. It is our effort. This is how we come to Him. He's a God of commandments. And here's what we must do. And in their mind, the relationship with God was like chewing out of a rock. Sweat. Work. And what they built with their own hands, what they thought would be wholly unacceptable to God, was like a cistern that was broken and it couldn't hold the living water. So there were people always thirsty because, beloved, in their minds had formed an opinion of God that was not true. In their minds, they thought religion was going to be something that they put their back to and chew it out. That when they heard the commandments and when they heard all that they had to do, the sacrifice, their natural mind sprung up and said, okay, I get it. I'm understanding what God wants us to do. We're going to work, work, work. We're going to like chew out a rock. And we all know that it's hard to please God for any length of time and the living water will run out and we'll always be a thirsty people but we'll work. God said you couldn't get it farther, farther away than what I planned for you. And what happens when we begin to work and what happens when we have wrong thoughts at the base of it, is that, beloved, we're beginning to build commandments of men and tradition of men and we begin to trust that more than the Word. And, beloved, God's Word starts competing against our own thoughts of Him. And our thoughts and our experiences and the neediness of our own heart, we begin to think this is who God is, this is what God wants, this is what I must do. The next column, of course, is what I can't do. And it's work, work, work. And God is saying here in Jeremiah 3, what He's saying is that you've got these thoughts of Me and they're competing with what I'm trying to tell you but your heads, your religious heads, are so full of what you think I need, what I want and what I'm asking you. And in verse Jeremiah 3, God says, I'm going to keep sending My Word to you. And this Word is going to expose what really is going on in your thought life and what is going on in your hearts. Because you're building your own system of what you think I want, because you are now, in your own flesh, trying to form your own religion with your hard work and you're trying to please Me. He says that it's going to take you to places you don't intend to go because men have to find satisfaction somewhere. And the Scripture tells us in Jeremiah 3, they say, If a man put away his wife and she go from him and become another man's, shall he return unto her again? Shall not that land be greatly polluted? But thou hast played the harlot with many lovers. Yet return again to Me, saith the Lord. And God is saying, You put away the relationship that I'm offering you and you are running now to find satisfaction in places, in many places, where I want to satisfy you. And you, because you need that satisfaction, you need relief in your soul. God is saying, I know that, My people. You need that sense of peace. You need that sense of release and that relief. I know that. But because you have a wrong conception of Me and because your own hearts will always be springing up and wanting to lead in the flesh, it's going to lead you to places where you're going to find satisfaction that will cause Me to have to put you away. But God is pleading with His people and He says, You know, in the natural, an unfaithful wife would be turned away. But He said, I'm asking you, return to Me. Return to Me. He says, I have things to speak to you and I want you to listen to Me. But beloved, they couldn't hear Him. And I kept thinking, God, what are you speaking to these people? What is it that you want to say about people who can move so far from you and so far from your plan and your will for their life? And God says in Jeremiah 3.14, He says, Turn, O backsliding children, saith the Lord, for I am married unto you. In verse 22, He says, Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backsliding. And I just keep hearing this appeal of God in Jeremiah to this thing, because He says, I know your end from your beginning. And I tell you something, you have separated yourself from Me. And now the sin in your heart and the lust, which are unsurrendered desires, are the ones that are springing up in your lives, in your minds. And you are so unsatisfied with Me. And I know it. And you know, all through Jeremiah, like for example, Jeremiah 4.14, God says, O Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness, that thou mayest be saved. How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge within Me? And I began to see that the Lord was trying to speak to me. And He was saying, Here is the root. There are competing thoughts. There we form a thing about who God is. It can be absolutely contrary to what He is saying to us. But the depth of the stronghold is such, beloved, that whenever we get into trouble, whenever we sin, whenever we fear, whenever we fail, what is lodged there at the stronghold automatically springs up into our minds and our thoughts and starts competing with what God says He does for us, who He is. And it begins very hard for us to hear. And we need to begin to recognize these thoughts that we may take them into captivity by the power of Christ and offer them to Him and say, Lord Jesus, right now the turmoil in my heart, the confusion that's facing me, show me what is truth. And speak Your Word to me. God, let me turn to Your Word. God, let me turn to You in prayer. You speak a word that You will witness to me as Yours. And then God, give me the grace to exalt it higher than my feelings and higher than the thoughts I have at this moment. Jeremiah begins to say all through it. He talks about, you don't need to turn there, but in verse 519, he says, You have forsaken me and You've served strange gods in Your land. He says in Jeremiah 6, 13, You're given to covetousness. You're always wanting something and you're never fully satisfied. In Jeremiah 11, 7 and 8, he said, You've not obeyed me, but You've inclined I near it. And everyone walked in the imagination of their evil heart. And beloved, you see God now, He's beginning to show them what is in their heart, what is the sin there, but what is the root, why they can never hear Him. When He speaks, they're going deaf to the voice of God. There are competing thoughts and God saying, I have to get to the root and bring down a wrong conception that you have of me. And because you have a wrong conception of me, and you're trying in your own strength to please me, there is no covering because I can't bless what is not of me. I cannot reinforce and tell you, Yes, you're on the right path. This is truly who I am. Because He can't bear witness to a lie. And the only way that He can begin to show us what are strongholds in our minds and our thoughts concerning God, and we are so firmly entrenched in them, we can't even see that it's not Him. And then we wonder why we're so unsatisfied. And finally, God is saying, You have walked in the imagination of an evil heart. And Jeremiah says in verse 12, 2, Thou art near in their mouth. He's talking about this people living in plan B, but are far from their reins. God is saying, I'm in their mouth, but I'm far from the reins. In other words, what is happening now is that I've got a people who live the way they feel is the best way to live. However that lines up with my word. They're going to tell me they're trying. They're going to tell me that, God, you know I'm doing my best here. That, God, you know I struggle in certain areas. But their faith and their trust is ebbing away because there is no change. And what is happening, God says, is that I am in their mouth, but I am far from the reins of their heart. In other words, I can't direct their lives, but they will come to church, and they will praise me, and they will say, God, we love you. But beloved, do you want to know some evidences if that is true? It's because when we come into His presence, when it comes to worship, all of a sudden, that kind of heart can't worship. The thought life is being dominated by conversations of the week. The thought of being dominated of this relationship or what needs to happen at work. There is no ability to worship. There is never any rest in the mind. All of a sudden, the mind is racing. And when you know it is time to worship, there is no sustained ability to worship. There is no rest in the spirit. There is no rest in the heart. God is saying, I've got to speak something to you. It's like there is... Let me explain it this way. I read a book this week. It's a very popular book. And I've been told that it is one of the best sellers that's going through Christendom right now. And it's a man, he wrote this book and he was writing to Christian men. And he is saying that he finds most Christian men are bored in church. And the reason why he feels that way is because he says that every man really wants a battle to fight. Every man wants to learn to be aggressive. That every man wants to find an exciting adventure in life. And that every man wants to find a beauty to rescue. Now beloved, he could be speaking for men. But when he says he is speaking for Christian men, when he says he is speaking for God, when he says this is what's in the heart of godly men, I take issue. I take issue because when I was reading this book at first when I got upset, you want to know all the sources. He was talking in this book, this Christian best seller, about all the movies he had seen. And he was drawing from the main character of those movies. And he was going, you know, like as you find in Braveheart and like what you find in Gladiator and like what you see the guy in Top Gun. And I was going, aren't you talking about Christianity? And beloved, what he was doing is that he was taking what the natural thoughts out of his own heart was and he was taking those thoughts of the natural man and the natural man will learn something from fables, will learn something from stories. We know this guy had integrity, this guy had courage. True. But the guys in the movies aren't real. You can't base your life on what's not true through and through in the spiritual realm. We can't grow on that. The scripture is what is truth. And every born again Christian has a spiritual man and a natural man. And only it's the spiritual man who speaks for God. It's the spiritual man that has the mind of God. It's the spiritual man that has the understanding of what God wants to do in him and for him. It is the natural man that has the ability to see the truth and how it applies to his life. But it is the natural man that has natural desires and this man was speaking right out of his own natural heart. But he wanted to give a Christian covering over it. And he wants to sell it to this generation and say this is what you're about and this is how you satisfy it. And as I was reading that book I was getting a little agitated and I was thinking how can people read this? It takes no discernment whatsoever. But as I read it to the end I grew very sad. Because by the time you read that book right to its conclusion you see a man who revealed himself I think more than he ever intended to do it. He revealed because it kept cropping up especially towards the end of the book. He says just even a few weeks ago so in other words he's written this whole book and now he's testifying of something that's currently happening in his life. He talks about when he and his wife get into an argument in his mind springs up I never should have married you. I could have married someone else. I could have done so much better. And beloved I'll tell you something he's a man totally unsatisfied in his marriage totally unsatisfied in his ministry totally unsatisfied with his walk of God and in that satisfaction he turned to his own heart and the needs of his own heart began to shape his theology because he says God I worship you I sing the songs of Zion I'm a leader in the body of Christ and what he's doing is all his unsatisfaction and unmet needs he's covering it over he's covering it he's bringing it into the house and he's saying I love you God but he's totally unsatisfied and God is trying to get to the root of every person in the house of God like that because beloved in our natural we're all like that there is something that God needs to get a hold of and speak to us in our unsatisfaction in our unmet needs you see this man here beloved I don't know his full story but I could see how the enemy you know he felt he made a wrong choice and now what is happening in his heart is that he in his own flesh there is a flesh battle going on and he regrets the day he married her now and from it has grown a contempt for woman and you see it in his writings and you see now when he began to interpret the book of Ruth he said that the primary purpose of women in the church is to be seductive and he backs it up by the book of Ruth and I'll tell you his theology has taken such an evil turn because he has unmet needs and yet we have a God in heaven that says I will meet every need but God will take us where our turmoil is in our mind or where we are unsatisfied and he will begin to lean on that and he's going to say look into your heart no running away why are you unsatisfied that is the love of God doing that and if that man would open up and say God go and speak whatever you have to speak you see every time there was an argument every time there was something he told us in the book that he didn't leave his wife or he hasn't left circumstances because he says my good heart keeps me on track you know because he could make an honest attempt in his marriage he could say okay I'm going to be loving with her I'm going to try when she goes through those bouts of depression when she acts like I don't want her to act I'm going to try to be loving I'm going to try to be understanding I'm going to reach out to her and a natural man can one, two, three times but I'll tell you something if it's not from the spirit of God we start keeping count we start keeping a record we start becoming blinded to all that I'm doing and all that she's not doing but beloved we drag it into the house and we say that God you are in my mouth but you are far from ruling my life and beloved this is what's happening in Plan B lives is that we will come to church and we will sing the songs and we will go through the motions but deep down we are so there is an area of deep discontent there is an area of pain there is an area of questions and the enemy now the enemy will come in and he will take that situation and that area and he will begin to say you've crossed the line with God you've made such a wrong choice back there that really you are now living on the lower level of God's plan for your life and it can't be turned about and what happened in the time of Jeremiah is that God kept sending a word my people turn to me return to me you think that this relationship that you understand me but I've got something to say to you you need a right understanding of my heart towards you beloved we have to understand one thing failure never puts us on the B plan failure never God knows this is flesh flesh and failure begin with the same letter it's like God needed to reinforce something whenever we trust flesh there is going to be fear and failure operating he said I knew that from the beginning that's why I sent my son it's because when we trust him he gives us a new spirit and that spirit man in us who is Jesus Christ begins to confront everything that is flesh and failure in us he says turn to me you can't do it I alone can and that becomes the hope but so many times we let the flesh and that has the enemy as a direct voice to come and begin to shape our theology and no matter what God begins to say between our experience and the popular word out there we begin to we don't understand how deeply embedded we have of ideas of God and beloved failure never puts us on the plan B road making a wrong choice a wrong choice does not put us on the plan B plan what does is when God can no longer speak to us because if we can't hear him we can't obey him if he can't lead us if he doesn't have the range to our life how can we be on plan A how can we say God's best and highest we're being led to beloved the only thing that takes us from plan A is if we can't hear him anymore in the areas where we need to hear him where because our torment or our anguish or our pain or our confusion or what's at the deepest part of our heart we feel for whatever reason we can't bring to the light or we won't deal with it you know maybe this man has thought I have dealt with it I have given her to God beloved the issue is not giving her to God the issue is God tear open this heart go to the depths of it show me who I am and show me what it is you need to speak to me whatever it is I am open to it because we are immediately in the will of God if God can speak to us we're in plan A because his word creates the life in us his word creates the desire in us his word puts us in another direction it is his voice that is life to us and when he speaks to us his word creates faith and we have a desire to start to say oh God give me the power to obey you on this now but we can't obey him but we don't hear him plan B is when we can't hear him anymore when Jeremiah God is saying to Jeremiah you have tell these people you have broken covenant with me tell them they have broken covenant with me and beloved we break covenant God says you break covenant with me when I can't talk to you anymore on that area and Jeremiah 7.30 says they have set their abominations in the house that is called by my name to pollute it and it's saying that we come to the house of God and we set all that's in our mind a racing mind a mind full of torment a mind full of pain a mind whatever and we cannot say God at this moment I'm going to exalt you and in exalting you I exalt the truth that God you are higher you are greater you see you know you alone have the plan you alone are the way out God at this moment when I come into your house I am going to I purpose in my heart to worship you at this moment beloved that is how we break begin to break the strongholds when we come in with a mind full of anguish and torment and our heart and our spirit say I can do anything but praise we say God give me the grace now to exalt you at this moment because the plan B people came and set their abominations all that their mind was full of all their mind was racing all their anxiety to the point beloved that God couldn't speak to them to the point where no matter whether he was full of entreaty and full of love with a return to me message or a message of judgment they couldn't hear and beloved I believe that God is saying I want an altar and I want you to put on that altar all that is your torment whether you know the source of it or not all that is your anguish all that is that racing all that would want to take you from hearing me that we say God when we gather in your name it is the most precious time because I'm going to hear from you I say I'm going to hear from you and when I hear from you the strongholds come down and when I hear from you I get strength to obey you hallelujah hallelujah now there was a man Daniel and he the Bible says in Daniel 1.8 it says Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself now he's a young man and he's been taken into captivity he was taken with the first group that went and now there's a point in Daniel's life that he looked back he's got no more homeland he's got no more temple there is no more people of God and I wonder if ringing in his ears were the word of Jeremiah where the word of Jeremiah finally went to people that wouldn't hear God Jeremiah began to say it is over it is finished I'll tell you what don't go to Egypt go to Babylon cooperate this is of God go to Babylon and all the prophets rose up and said this is not God I'll tell you one thing we're prophets and this is not God God's not going to turn his heritage out of his land God is not going to empty the land of his people and make it empty this is not God you see Jeremiah we are God's chosen people and the land is our heritage and the land is the symbol God is with us and the land is the symbol that we alone of all the earth have the God the most high God is our God this is not a word from God they say pointing to Jeremiah God would say and Jeremiah would say listen to me this is God go to Babylon don't go to Egypt it was such a symbol you've got one final choice to make God has determined something here and you know what he's going to shake out finally those that can hear from those that can't there can be a people that will come a nation that will come and they'll say we worship you God we love you God and we'll sing every song we know but your heart you don't have the reign to our heart you don't direct you don't lead us really but our mouths are full of you and God says at that point I'm going to empty the land and my inheritance and everything I had in my heart for these people I will empty it out and with a group that can hear me I will start again but those that won't their destination is Egypt their destination you want the thoughts of the world and how the world says about me and how the world defines me and how the world says this relationship goes you want to keep on hewing out of a rock that won't hold living water you go right ahead but you're going to fall to the pestilence the famine and the sword you're going to die with my name in your mouth but you will not know my protection and you will not know my blessing and your seed will grow and be raised in Egypt and God gets to a point where he says there's going to be one final thing hear me and he will empty the land of his heritage to start again with a few that can hear him and Daniel is a man now in Babylon and I'll tell you something the scripture says he purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself and that word purposed means beloved purpose means establish a new relationship purpose means to bring about a change purpose means to be set aside for some special purpose the scripture says that in his heart he was saying give God a new relationship God lest you bring one to me I don't know how to get it because we're not in the land anymore is this not new ground I'm so dependent on you it was God if you don't bring about a change in the way that I think about you and I need to know your thoughts towards me because I'm not in that land of protection and promise God a change I'm desperate to be set aside for some special purpose oh God could it be true could I be part of a people oh God that so refused to hear you that you had to shake us out of our inheritance and what formed us as a people who am I now oh God in you who am I but he purposed in his heart and God said that there would be a change in the relationship and there you would be set aside for some special purpose because all those in plan A find out the promised land is not a place out here it's not circumstances out here it's not the anxiety and the oppression that forms us it's what we have of him in here and when we purpose in our heart a people who live in plan A said God I thank you for everything that shook me awake I thank you for every pain every torment every anguish of spirit that's getting me to the place where I'm saying God real God make it honest make it you but speak to me what is the depth what is the root and then God a new place where I can trust and believe you even in the midst of where I thought you could never speak or where you'd never give me the grace to trust you Daniel purposed in his heart and beloved it said he would not defile himself defile means to free and repudiate believe it or not it means where Daniel has to repudiate the lies of failure all the time that I'm failing that I failed God beloved Daniel would have had all the time an enemy saying you think you're gonna serve God here you've been turned out of the land you've canceled it look at you guys have blown it God's turning to another people God's turning to another man he can't use you don't you get it? you've been taken out of the promised land and in Babylon if you couldn't serve him there what makes you think you can serve him and never can use his court? and that man had the purpose in his heart God I believe you now you say you offer me a new relationship you offer me a new beginning if I but trust you if you will say God I'll bare open my heart and whatever you have to speak to me I'll receive it but then God I believe you that you love me you have a purpose for me even here in Babylon your hand's not too short and even though you've turned out of people oh God my heart can cry out to you a whole nation can pat you in their mouths but not reigning over their lives but God where you've led me to this hard place where the enemy everyday says you are nothing but a failure to this hard place it doesn't make any sense but I tell you Babylon was God's plan for his chosen people Babylon now in the history of Israel represented a people who could hear Babylon now represented a people who were desperate to say God every false notion I have about you that has blinded me to the truth you've been trying to speak to me for the longest of times oh God I tear open my heart say what you will but speak where your word is so precious to me because every time you speak it's my stability and my life we gotta get there God give us the grace to open our eyes to see that sometimes we're in the hardest places the Babylon we look around we see it looks like everybody's enjoying the promised land by me but it's a lie Daniel was appointed to that place Babylon and so he had not defiled himself I will not let the devil again define who God is to me and how God works with me and Daniel would have to keep repudiating that lie that I'm a failure because things can't be the same anymore that there's a line being crossed that I've messed it up too badly that I'm in the hardest of places that I'm out of God's reach beloved, that's a lie things have not gone too far for anyone who can still hear his voice hear me beloved plan B is only for those who won't listen to what needs to what God needs to say to them because there can never be obedience if we can't hear but plan A plan A beloved plan A is a glorious place because the word of God is there because the word a living word is there because when we can hear him we have everything whether it's Babylon or Israel whether we're in the midst of a backsliding people who just want to play church we can have something real what we have to be honest we have to say God every false thing I've erected in you if you have to admit the most horrible thing you can think about yourself beloved do it because we entrust it to God and we say God is it true or not we do have an enemy that will condemn us and say we can never be forgiven but somehow when we're totally honest with God he brings nothing but terms of forgiveness and return to me I love you I'm married to you I will heal your backsliding will be God's word to us and then beloved finally when we can hear him that is such strength because now we have a purpose and a direction and when we can hear him we can say oh God give me the grace and the strength to obey you fully and God loves honesty I came across this verse that I just want to close with but it's Hebrews 5-7 and it goes like this that Jesus who in the days of his flesh when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death and he was heard let me stop right there it's talking about a time in Jesus life when he was in his flesh and he began to offer up prayers and strong crying and tears unto a father able to save him from death and he was heard but his prayer was this Father let this cup pass from me and he was heard there was a flesh God let this cup pass from me but you know the ending but he ended it with God not my will but thine that Jesus is our example is that everything concerning our flesh and our desires we wrap it by this one prayer here it is but not my will but thine every prayer that we pray concerning ourselves gets wrapped in that just like Jesus did go ahead do the strong praying do the strong crying do the supplication like Jesus did in the days of his flesh and know that we are heard but beloved when we coach it and say around but God let it pass from me but if not, not my will but thine beloved we can bare our heart to him we can pour everything out to him and God will bring that healing and then God will bring that strength to obey him even when it goes against our flesh beloved there is nothing but hope hope, hope to those that will say God I thank you that I'm hearing today that if I can still hear you and you're creating a desire in me to obey you not my will but thine I'm in plan A it doesn't matter what's happened in my past life it doesn't matter how many wrong terms I've made it doesn't matter how much the devil is oppressing me that I've missed it here and now I have to live on this level everybody else has another chance but me it's a lie in Christ we purpose we set our heart to say I believe if I can hear you God if I can still hear you you will deal with me as a son and you will lead me and God where I can't hear you where I need a new revelation where I need truth to break through God give me the grace whatever you have to say because I know it's going to be for my healing and my good I know you'll stand me up on my feet in the power of the spirit and I will have hope I will have a hope every day and the enemy won't be able to shut me down when I fail or when I fear beloved it's an incredible thing and the end result of Daniel's life the scripture says living in Babylon was a man with an excellent spirit the bible says he had an excellent spirit there is liberation of the mind yes it will be warfare but when we know who God is and what his thoughts are towards us and he can speak anything we get a clear mind because we have the mind of God and there is not a clearer mind in the universe than the mind of God and anything that keeps us having the mind of God we are more than conquerors the enemy can't condemn us out of our full salvation he can't try to get us to the point of believing a lie about God himself and his heart towards us so beloved I know you join with me so many that can hear this oh God my whole life open before you whatever you have to say speak it oh God for it's all about returning and healing it's all about teaching me to put the condemner under my foot and to remind me that I am in plan A in the very center of your will and that you're highest and best for my life and the call of my life goes unhindered as long as I can hear you and beloved we need to cry keep me humble God and keep me open because the most precious thing to me is you and your voice to me and that we have a plan A life hallelujah will you stand with me hallelujah those that right now I would just like to open this altar to those that are knowing a real anguish and a torment in their mind those that when you come to worship there is no peace but the events of your life and what you're grappling with want to rob you of that worship beloved we're going to God has an altar here for those that are struggling with thoughts that I failed you God I have taken a wrong road that God I have to battle so hard to believe that I am on track that I am hearing from you that God you that I haven't messed things up so bad that I'm now living on another plane for those that want that want to come and say God I offer you the torment and the anguish in my mind and spirit and I'm coming to receive from you a new beginning and a new hope will you come as the musicians play there's a song that says who will lead me into the strong city and beloved our our thoughts are like a strong city a fortress sometimes no other thoughts will get in but the ones we're thinking but it says will not thou oh God give us help oh God give us help from trouble for vain is the help of man through God we shall do valiantly for he it is that shall tread down our enemies beloved God will lead into the strong city that are these thoughts in our mind that have entrenched themselves and we sometimes don't know how deep they go but we don't need to know but we do need to know that God when these thoughts this oppression this troubling that I have failed you that I've crossed a line there can be no new beginning for me there can be no hope for tomorrow that it will be fresh and clean like I'm a babe in you that's a lie in Christ that we can hear him today he promises us a new beginning because if we can hear him he can lead us and we can start today plan B gets cancelled plan B gets cancelled as long as we say God give me a heart to hear you and then I'm trusting you for the strength to obey you and what I hear if you're saying forgive lay it down walk away release whatever you have to say to me whatever you speak when you say believe me I will give you a new beginning sometimes that's the hardest battle that I give you a new beginning that I can cancel all the failure and I cancel the wrong ways you have gone because I would be a lesser God if I could not but since I'm God almighty if I say that now you can hear me and I can lead you it's a new beginning then it's to trust him sometimes that's the biggest battle that's the stronghold the Holy Ghost wants to lead us to that God I'm going to believe you now when you say that I purpose in my heart that means I believe there's a new relationship a change that's a special purpose you have for my life is not broken love we're going to believe that everything else will take care of itself if we can believe that so we're just going to lift our hands in faith and I would just like to lead us oh God I thank you that Lord just let me pray for us for a minute God I thank you that you will give us a spirit of Daniel we can purpose in our heart to believe you for this new beginning believe you that the special purpose in our lives goes forth as we trust you Jesus you will lead us into the strongholds of our mind and you will expose the lies of the enemy that God you will speak your word to us God we're trusting you now for you to speak the word that breaks the power of the lie breaks the power of the condemnation breaks the power of the sense of failure and God we know that every time this battle arises in our mind God you will put into us oh God a cry for you a cry for a word from you a cry oh God for a living word and then God you're going to set us free because we're going to get stronger because we're going to receive the word God I pray now for the power to receive your word that God when you say to us that if we purpose in our heart if we believe for that new beginning if we believe oh God there is a new relationship that we cry out for you grant it this is the conclusion of the message