In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the transformative power of God's mercy in revealing one's true nature. He uses the analogy of a person trying to escape from God's conviction, but ultimately being confronted with their own selfishness and sinfulness. The sermon then shifts to discussing salvation and the Christian walk, highlighting the importance of sanctification and the ongoing steps in the Christian life. The speaker encourages the audience to seek a deeper understanding of God and to recognize their need for His mercy and grace.

Hello, this is Brother Denny. Welcome to Charity Ministries. Our desire is that your life would be blessed and changed by this message. This message is not copyrighted and is not to be bought or sold. You are welcome to make copies for your friends and neighbors. If you would like additional messages, please go to our website for a complete listing at www.charityministries.org. If you would like a catalog of other sermons, please call 1-800-227-7902 or write to Charity Ministries, 400 West Main Street, Suite 1, EFRA PA 17522. These messages are offered to all without charge by the freewill offerings of God's people. A special thank you to all who support this ministry. Can we stand for prayer? Our Father, we humbly bow before you this evening again and acknowledge that we love you. We delight in your word. We are so thankful tonight that you have wrought righteousness in our hearts through faith and that you are still working in our hearts. Oh, Father, I pray that somehow you would be able to work through your word tonight and that somehow this vessel would in no way hinder you from that which you is a burden of your heart to be shared tonight. Lord, it's not about me. It's about you, Father, and your Son and the Holy Ghost. And so, Father, tonight I just resign myself to you as a vessel in your hand. Yes, wherein abides the Holy Ghost. Father, we look to you for all that shall be said tonight. Would you receive all the glory and the honor through Jesus' name. Amen. You may be seated. I can say that I am enjoying this week very much. Very much. Are you enjoying it this week? I also thought about some of the distractions that so easily are there claiming for our attention, taking our attention away from the word that is shared and so forth. It's my desire that somehow God would in His mercy hold back or take away the distractions tonight. So I appreciate the family verses and songs. I want to speak tonight about that holy temple. I'd like to begin with the verse that Mark shared about in Revelations when John saw the Lord Jesus. It says there that, When I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. There's other places in the Bible where men had a revelation of God and they fell on their faces as dead. Ezekiel, when he saw the glorious vision of God, it says, And when I saw it, I fell upon my face. What makes them fall on their face? Isaiah says that when he saw that, he laid and he said, Woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. For my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. It's my desire to somehow unload the burden that's on my heart tonight by God's grace. To me, it would be one of the most beautiful things if God in His mercy would reveal to us His glory and would really, and would open up our blinded eyes to see that which we don't even know is there in our own lives. But I have no doubt in my mind that if God were to do that to any one man here tonight, he would fall on the floor. If God were to open his eyes and he could see a little bit of the glory of God and could see his own wretchedness, he would be unable to stand. He would fall flat on the floor. Many things on my heart. I'd like to share a message and I think I will call it something like, Gird up now thy loins. And I think that we don't have a very good picture of that. Us men don't wear robes that go down to our feet. And so I brought one of our bedsheets along tonight just to illustrate this. In the Bible days, the men, they wore robes and it may not have looked like this, but they were down. It was like a dress that went down to their ankles. And it's a little difficult to run when you have a robe on like this. And so there's Peter, he says, Gird up now the loins of your mind. But there's other places in the Bible where we can read that the men, they girded up their loins and they ran. And so what they did, they would reach down, they'd take that thing up and they'd pull it up around their waist and tuck it in and then they could run. And so tonight, if somehow God would get glory that He could convince you, convince me, as men, that there's work to be done. There's work to be done. I'd like to just look a little bit at several things here. First of all, I'm going to look at salvation. I would hope that most of the men here are born again, but I know there's lots of women and children here also. And I know that there must be many people here who are not born again. But I want to look at salvation a little bit. And basically what we're looking at is the walk of the Christian life. Looking at salvation, that's the initial experience in the Christian life. And then we'll look at sanctification, if I can spell it right. And then there's other steps. There's more steps to the Christian life than just that. There's a lot more to the Christian life than just being born again. There's something called sanctification. It's where you go on in Christian life. And there's also, I would like to talk a little bit about a couple of other areas. And this one is consecration. While they are very close to each other, it's consecration. I don't know if I can spell. They may be very close to each other, yet they are also very different. And I don't want to talk about brokenness. And lastly, anointing. And I look at this a little bit as these are different phases of the Christian life, you might say. And I don't know in which phase or which area that you are in. There's another little drawing I'd like to put on the board. And that is that of the inward man, as it speaks of in 2 Corinthians, I think it's chapter 4. It's called the inward man. And then we have another one that is called the outward man. And then we have what I would call the physical body, or the outermost man. And one of the things about this, one of the burdens on my heart, is that we need to recognize that the inner man, the inward man, is where the Spirit of God dwells at salvation. Working in and through us and using the outward man and the body to manifest the glory of God and so forth. Let's look a little bit at salvation. We know that Jesus Christ has come to save the sinners, those that are lost. And I don't know if you're here tonight and not saved. But I suppose there may be some. But God has sent His Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. If you're here tonight and you're not saved, then I would say you are missing out in some of the best of living. But I also recognize that in order for someone to be saved, there needs to be coming into their heart a drawing from the Father. And when that begins to happen, there also needs to be for Him to be able to see. For a man to be able to see what he really is in the sight of God, there must also be some revelation. Light must shine into the heart. Light needs to come down upon the person. And unless God in His mercy reveals to the person his lost estate, he will not cry out for salvation. That's the picture I see. And the means to be saved is what? When a person sees his need of a Savior, he needs to confess that he's a sinner. He needs to repent of his sin. And he needs to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. As it says in Romans, that with the mouth confession is made, with the heart man seeth unto salvation. This is more than just a lip profession. This is where you actually engage your heart to the place where you are saved. That's the picture. I don't want to dwell long on that, but I would like to make comments also about baptism. This would be my heart about baptism. I believe that when adults get saved, they should be baptized. I would long to have the kind of testimony. Let me ask you this. What is the testimony of the charity churches? Is there a testimony out there that when people get saved, they get baptized? I believe that we should be baptizing new converts very shortly after salvation. I would long to have a fear struck into the hearts of the heathen around us to such an extent about baptism. So much so that when someone gets converted, they also hear that they've gotten baptized. I believe that our forefathers in the Anabaptists way back in the 1600s, the issue was baptism. And I believe there's a reason why in every account of the Book of Acts, when there's a conversion there and baptism follows it, it is immediately. The longest one is three days. Well, you might say we like to have the church there to baptize them, to witness it. That's not even scripture necessarily. They baptize them in the spot. Oh, what a longing it would be. And I do believe, brothers and sisters, that we need to follow these things. It would strike fear in the hearts of the people around us. And they would hear that dust and dust got baptized. I believe God would honor some of that. Let's go on to sanctification. I want to put a little more time on this one. By the way, I'll take this thing off. It's too warm. Sanctification. Now, in one sense, I believe that God does a work of sanctifying in our hearts at the place of conversion. When we repent of our sins, we acknowledge that we're a sinner, we acknowledge that we're lost, and we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. There's a place there where God does sanctify us and He cleanses us and He washes us. And this word sanctify simply means to clean or to wash. It also means somewhat to separate or to consecrate, it might mean. Another meaning is to purify by expiation or by making amends. And so one part of this sanctification is, and this is how it was in my life when I got converted, I had a lot of amends to make. I had restitution to make. And I want to lift it up a little bit here this evening and say, brother or sister, if you have gotten saved and you've never went and made amends, if you've never gone back and made all those things right as the Spirit of God brings them to you, then I believe that you are somewhat staunched or stayed or stopped in your Christian growth. Maybe it's a pack of gum at the store. I shared this message last Sunday and a brother came to me and said, I just thought about it, I never made it right when I stole a bicycle. And I don't know what it is in your life, but if there's anything back there, this is a picture of sanctification and my burden in my heart is that somehow we as men would rise up, would gird up our loins, may I say, and do something about these issues. How can I continue on in my Christian life if I don't rise up and take the bull by the horns, may I say, if I don't gird up my loins and begin to run? There are people who get saved when they sit in front of a television set or listen to a TV evangelist and he's preaching salvation through faith in Jesus Christ and people can be saved that way and they do get saved. Just simply repenting and acknowledging that they need a Savior, you can be saved that way. But all the struggle, the difficulty that many have worked through, that many have walked out afterward. Why am I not having victory? Why am I continually tempted in this certain area or this area? What about all this baggage I have back here? There's a need. Is there a need in your life to cleanse, to sanctify? I feel sorry for those who have never had a very thorough session of repentance in their life. They have never sat down with an open heart and just acknowledged everything, every sin in the past where you might say, why is that necessary? I've been saved. I've been washed in the blood. That's right, my brother and my sister. But if those things are still back there, if they're still standing back there, if they still bother you, if they're still coming to you at times, especially when you go to kneel in prayer and some memory comes back to you again and again and again, I say it must, you need to confess it. You need to repent of it. Cleanse your ways, my brother and my sister. How are we sanctified? Well, is that all the Lord's work? 1 Peter 1.2 says, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ, through sanctification of the Spirit. God does His part in sanctifying us, in cleansing us, in washing us. But there is also a part that you and I have, 2 Timothy 2.21. If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified, meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work. That is our responsibility. I need to do something. And there may be, maybe you're sitting here tonight, and you've never thoroughly searched the records that are written about you, and went back there and sought them out, and cleansed yourself of all these unholy, profane things that you've done, either in your body, or you've thought you've sinned in your soul. Maybe you've sinned in the body, but the soulish part of man is where you think, and you desire, and all those type of things. Even though you've been born of the Spirit of God, and this is where the Spirit of God dwells, a holy temple. But the Spirit of God, you can bind the Spirit of God, and in a sense, you can keep the Spirit of God from flowing freely. And if you and your soul, and your outward man, if your outward man is a strong, defensive type person, if this is who you are, and the Spirit of God dwells in your spirit, and they are so synonymous, you can't divide the two, the Spirit of God in your spirit. But, you can hinder the Spirit of God from flowing freely out of your being. God wants you and I to be freely, to be vessels whereby He can use, He can come in, and He can flow freely out through us. But, brothers and sisters, if in your Christian life you have a lot of undealt-with issues in your past, these things will hinder you from becoming effective, from becoming a useful servant in the hand of God. Have you ever cleansed yourself? What about, I would recommend any one of you fathers, take the book of Leviticus, and read how to have a clean home, a clean body, and so forth. Clean foods. No, not according to the Old Testament law, but there's principles there that are still standing today. There's many unclean spirits that have gone forth and troubled many homes because the Father has not cleansed His ways. This is a burden on my heart. One of the burdens that the Lord laid on my heart this morning was personally for myself. This is how I feel. If I don't get it this week, woe is me. Let me explain. I'm so blessed with the messages that we're getting, the incomparable Christ, a picture of the church, the body of Christ, but especially on the Father-Son issue. That's my greatest need. And I'm crying out to God. I'm saying, God, unless You do something in my heart this week concerning this issue, woe is me. Woe is me if I don't get it this week. Woe is the man who sits in the sound of my voice and doesn't get it this week. Woe to the church, to the church leaders, and woe to the churches. Woe to the charity movement if we don't get it this week. Woe is me if I don't get it unless God will open my eyes, unless God by somehow brings a revelation to me of my need as a father, then woe is me. In every one of these steps, every one of these things, it takes revelation from God to go on. Some of us carry a lot of baggage around. You know, a man who carries a stick on a pole traveling down the road. It's kind of a picture we have of the son leaving the father in Luke there. He put his stuff in a bag or so, and away he goes. He carried his baggage with him. I wonder how much baggage you've brought with you this week. How big is the cart behind you? There are some people who carry a lot of baggage with them all the time. Old sins that have never been dealt with. Old things that have never been freely opened up and confessed, but I want to encourage you. God has made a way for you not just to be saved, but God has also made a way for you and I to be sanctified, to be clean, to be holy. And you and I have something to do. And I want to say to my brothers tonight and my sisters, gird up the loins of your mind. Gird up your loins now, like a man, and run. Do something about it. In Psalm 64, you could turn there, but I see that Satan and his hosts, they accomplish a diligent search. They commune together to lay snares. And they say, who shall see it? They have the records of your life, my brother and my sister. Satan knows. His evil ints, they can search your records. What does your record look like? Are your records clean? Are you sanctified? Or are there things in your life that open the door for them to come in and to torment you or your family, your wife or your children? It's a grief when a father comes to you and he says, my six-year-old girl, about a year ago, she started doing these odd things. Just kind of spacing out. And he said, she also has nightmares. And I only need to ask one question. And I asked him, I said, what happened just before she started acting that way? Did anything happen at that time? Was there any kind of trauma in her life? Something major? Did something major happen to this innocent, little, beautiful girl at the age of six years? Oh, yeah, he said. She was molested. And her heart just broke. Fathers, are you clean? Fathers, is your heart right? If you have allowed the enemy, if you have the enemy who has searched the records of your life and he has found that there's some things there that have never been dealt with, he can see that they're not under the blood of Christ. And there's access there into your life and you're being troubled by those things. You heard it mentioned on Monday evening, all the evil things that should not even need to be mentioned. But this is the reality. When Satan finds an avenue through the father or through the mother who have never cleansed themselves, who have never been sanctified through and through with a great desire and a zeal to be clean and holy and pure in every area, Satan has an access into your lives and he has access into your homes. And he's allowed to come in there and trouble your children. And so you think, we go to a good church. It's safe. Never. Don't trust. Know where your children are at. And this isn't just one of many instances that I could tell you about. Fathers, mothers, let's face it. Have I taken care of all those issues? I thank God that when we got converted, we dealt with all these issues as far as we knew. Everything was brought out in the open. Everything was out there. Even for the next couple of days, the next couple of weeks as we heard the Word of God preached and we kept on being cleansed and cleansed and the altar call was made and we hit the altar again because the Lord had spoken and had revealed another area of my life. And so I want to say, unless God reveals to you some of these things in your own heart which you don't even know are there, maybe you will never take care of the things that you don't know about unless you begin by dealing with the things you do know about. There's much more that God wants to do in our hearts and lives. You will never. I don't think you'll get past this area. You won't be able to go on in your Christian life unless you deal with this area of sins committed in your body. God wants you to be clean and pure. So, my heart, my burden is to your fathers, to the person who is here tonight who has not thoroughly dealt with every area in his life. I want to say to you, gird up your loins now like a man. You can find it in Job. Gird up now thy loins like a man and do something about it. I'm not preaching a gospel of works. No. We're saved through faith in Christ, but you and I have a responsibility. You and I need to follow through with these things that we've done in the past. Oh, that you would recognize the urgency of it. Children. Well, children can be set free. I remember the testimony of another father who recognized his... I think it was like an 8-year-old girl was acting strangely. And so they did some research with their sons, younger sons, and they said, oh, the neighbor boy. And they took their sweet, innocent 8-year-old who had been defiled and they walked her through that. They helped her walk through that and prayed over her and claimed her back to the Lord Jesus Christ. And today that girl is a godly young lady. It's possible, fathers and mothers, for your children to walk in holiness and it's possible that you as a father, you have the right in your home. You are the authority in your home. You should be able to walk your children if they have been defiled. Take them and walk them out of that in cleanliness and holiness even as an innocent little 6, 7, 8-year-old. Woe. Woe unto you if you don't do something about it. Woe. Oh, woe is me. Woe is me if I don't respond when God reveals things to me. Consecration means to set apart or to fill up. One of the meanings is to add what is yet wanting in order to render a thing full. It certainly means to take something and add to it so that it might be full. That's the picture of consecration. And so when we get saved, our sins have been washed and cleansed. We walk a while. We begin to walk and the Spirit of God in us begins to enlighten us to some of our past, some of our things. And we begin to confess. We begin to repent. There should always be such an open heart willing, quick and free to repent and make things right. Oh, I had the blessed opportunity of working with a couple just recently. They had asked for some time together. So we planned it out ahead of time, a week or so. We planned to meet there on a certain morning. And we went there and it was such a beautiful thing. One of those blessings for ministers, may I say. They were just like putty. They were just so sweet and so open. The Lord had been working in their lives. We just barely got there and the Father, He grabs His tablet. He says, Oh, come on in and sit down. I want to share with you what the Lord is showing me. And He had a list of the things God has shown Him that week. Just little things in the back of His life that I never uncovered, you know. Those things that happened back there in my teenage years. He had never uncovered them. He just, maybe He never knew it was needed. But all of me plead with you, Fathers, if you have things in your background, you have never opened up freely and shared with any one person. Oh, I beg you, gird up your loins now like a man and do something about it. You only open the doors to destruction to your family, to your children. And so this couple, they just openly confessed everything in the back of their lives. Everything that was back there. What a blessing! And the children were there. Sweet, pure, innocent. That type of person is ready to go on with God. That type of person can make large strides in his life with God. That brings us to the place of consecration. It's almost like, in one sense, it's like sanctification, but I want to say that it's a little bit different in this way. I think of Abraham. Abraham consecrated his son Isaac to the Lord. It doesn't give us a specific time when he did that. I'm not talking about Mount Moriah. Abraham had consecrated everything he had to God long before Mount Moriah. And consecration is simply coming to a place of willingness in your heart and saying, Lord, I am laying out to you everything I have. I'm giving you everything in my life. I give you the right to do whatever you want in my life. That's the picture of consecration. This is where we wholly offer ourselves unto God. And we simply say, Lord, I don't care what it costs. I don't care how it happens. But Lord, I'm giving myself wholly unto you. And what God does with a person who does that, with all of his heart, he begins to work deeper and deeper on that person, in that person's life. Working out some of his character flaws, may I say. Working out in those areas which most of us have right. Consecration is simply allowing God to have his full right in my whole life. That is the picture. This is where we let go of our most cherished dreams. This is where we let go of our visions and desires. Even our gifts and abilities that God has given, including the ministry which we believe God has given. Consecration is simply offering everything to God. Laying it on the altar and taking your hands off with no strings attached. We allow and we give the right to the Lord to do what he sees we need without reserve. Neither yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but yield yourselves unto God as though they are alive from the dead. And your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercy of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, holy. Don't even try to consecrate yourself to God unless you're holy and pure unto God, which is acceptable unto him, which is your reasonable service. One of the problems that we have is that the inward man, where the Spirit of God dwells, needs to be able to move freely and flow freely through the outward man and to be manifested in our bodies. Maybe some of you preachers know what I'm talking about. You ever have a deep burden on your heart and you have something deep in here that you'd like to get out and share, but you really can't release it. You can't let it go. You just can't open up and let it flow. There's not a flowing stream coming out of you. It's your unbrokenness because you've never been broken of your own way, never been allowed God to work deeply in that area. This is the place of when we consecrate ourselves to God, we're simply laying everything on the altar and taking our hands off and allowing God to work. And when Abraham was tried, he took his son Isaac and he offered him up on the altar. You see, Isaac had already... Abraham had already consecrated Isaac long before that. This was just the outworking of the reality of it. And so, okay, you say, Lord, I give you my farm. I give you my property. I give you my bank account. I give you my wife. Doesn't Jesus say, except a man forsake father, mother, houses, wife, land, and yea, his own life. He cannot be my disciple. Don't you see a clear break there? Okay, I wonder how many of you are lost. Is there anyone who's not following with me? Which place here are you saying, well, I'm just not going to go any further? I doubt whether any of you would actually do that. Where you would just back away and say, well, I'm not going to go there. My Christian life is okay. I'm okay where I'm at. You're missing it. Woe to the man. Woe to the person who won't continue on. Woe to that person who looks back and goes backwards. Except the corn of wheat fall on the ground and die to bite us alone. But if it dies, bring it forth much fruit. Turn with me to John chapter 12. A little bit on brokenness. Verse 1, John 12 verse 1. Then Jesus six days before the Passover came to Bethany where Lazarus was which had been dead, whom he raised from the dead. This is just before he entered into Jerusalem. There they made him a supper and Martha served, but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with him. Then took Mary a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly, and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with their hair and the house was filled with the odor of the ointment. What a blessed picture that is. Here's Jesus sitting at the table sitting there fellowshipping and eating and Mary comes along with a bottle of some kind of very costly, special ointment and she breaks that bottle, I don't know what it was made of, and she pours that oil, that spikenard, on the feet of Jesus and it says that the that the odor of the ointment filled the house. This picture of breaking that vessel that vessel is in a sense like our outward man. The outward man is where our soulish part of our being is and this outward man is what contains the inward man. The inward man is where the Spirit of God dwells. That's where the anointing is. That's where the costly spikenard is. And unless this outward man is broken, this ointment cannot be smelled or tasted, you might say, or you hinder the work of God. And so there are, and I think I know what it's like. There's a place in my life where I was just longing to release and to be used of God and I trust most of us have a deep desire to be used of God. But unless this outward man is broken, this ointment, the Spirit of God cannot flow freely through us or unhindered through us. It's an amazing thing how the Spirit of God dwells in us and uses us and even uses our character, our nature and our flavor. And so when the Spirit of God comes flowing out of me, it's flavored with who I am. And when the Spirit of God comes moving and flowing through you, it's flavored with who you are, in a sense. But unless the outward man is broken, unless this outward man is broken, the inward man is constricted or held back and not free to be released outward. But when the outward man is broken, then the Spirit of God is free to flow out through that outward man. But there are some who might say, why was this waste? We shouldn't have broken that vessel. We should have gotten the oil out without breaking the vessel. There are some who would honor the bottle more than the ointment. The bottle is too precious to break. But we're not collectors of antiques. We don't want to collect antiques. Give me the ointment. Who cares about the bottle? Give me the anointing. I don't care about the breaking of the bottle. I want to be a useful vessel where the Spirit of God is free to flow through without hindrance. This again is the work of the Holy Spirit. And this again comes by revelation. Each step of the way, there needs to be a revelation. And I was so blessed this week. This is the revelation! This is the revelation, my brothers. The Word of God. But I also know, blessed is the man, how happy is the man when God, in His great mercy, will open a man's eyes a little bit to see, to get another glimpse of the glory of God, to get another glimpse of who He really is. Oh, blessed is the man whose eyes God has opened to see who He is. Because when you really see who you are again, and you see the glory of God, and you see yourself, it's simultaneous. You fall on your face. You fall on your face. Now, some of you may not have experienced a Christian life in all these certain steps, and that's not what I'm saying. They may vary. You might have, and they integrate somewhat and all of that. I'm just giving you a little bit of an overview, a picture of what I believe is some reality in our Christian life. The Word of God is quick and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword, dividing asunder the soul and the spirit. The Word of God is sharp. It can divide between these two. The problem is if your soul and your spirit is not divided, if there's not been a division made between those two, there's a mixture there. The soulish part of you is still in control. The Spirit of God is hindered from flowing through you. That old man likes to get the glory. The old man stands there beside you when someone compliments you, and he's just grinning away, a big smile. Yeah, look at me. Does anyone know what I'm talking about? Am I the only one that goes through that? Or has gone through it? But, oh, happy, blessed is the man who can walk through a time of death, who can walk through a time of crucifixion, who will allow the difficult times of life to come upon him. God has a purpose in mind, my brother and sister. A broken man doesn't need to press his point. He doesn't need to defend himself. He doesn't need to have things his own way. He's not proud. He's not selfish or stubborn. He doesn't demand his own way. This brokenness and this anointing is simultaneous, may I say. When there's a broken vessel, the anointing flows automatically. The smell of the sweet savor of life comes forth, and it's a sweet, sweet thing. I'd like for us to turn to Job for illustration here. I think most of us would remember the story of Job. And at first reading, I was intrigued with the scenario of how Satan walked before God and all those type of things. And that kind of caught me. And the last chapter of the story is a beautiful chapter, and so all the long chapters in between I didn't pay much attention to. Anyone else like that? Job was blessed of God. But God, I do believe, God had a plan. God wanted to work something in Job's life. Amen? Did God want to work something in Job's life? Is it possible that God wants to work something in your life? But I can't see it. It's possible that you've been sanctified. You've taken care of everything you know in your life. And oh, I would to God that every one of you would be at that place where you've thoroughly dealt with everything in the past. And you've gone on to consecrate yourself fully to God. And Lord, it doesn't matter to me anymore. I just want to live for you and with your heart. And you can say all those words, but unless there's a revelation in your heart and life, and you see it in the Word of God, and the Spirit of God moves in your heart, and you begin to see what God wants, it could be just a little profession too. But I... Oh, what a beautiful thing if God would really show us. Job, I do believe, God wanted to work in Job's life. And if you're here tonight and you have consecrated yourself, you're sanctified, I promise you, God wants to do more in your life. He wants to do more in your life. He wanted to do more in Job's life. God allowed Satan to go. Satan was just a tool in his hand. Amen? Satan was just a tool in God's hand. God had an ultimate purpose and goal. And this is where it becomes difficult. You and I, we can read this story. And we can see behind the scenes. God has allowed us to look behind the scenes and watch this man Job go through this difficult time in his life. He didn't know what was going on. He didn't understand why these things happened. But you and I can read from the background. We see the hand of God working in Job's life. We see that it was Satan who brought these things upon him. Amen? And we watch Job. There he is. And we watch his response. God is looking for something. Even after his children were killed and everything he had was taken away. It says, In all this Job sinned not, nor charged God foolishly. Verse 1, chapter 22. Satan came again. He had failed. He failed to cause Job to get discouraged or curse God. So he got permission to go deeper and to plague him with everything he could. And Job burst out with boils from the top of his head to the sole of his foot. Painful boils. Some of these people who come home from Ghana, West Africa, they come home with boils. And if you're not careful, those boils will soon grow to the size of a quarter and a hole a half inch deep. And it keeps eating and eating. Unless you somehow stop it and turn it around. Job had boils from the top of his head to the bottom of his sole. In all of that, it says Job did not sin with his lips. His wife came and spoke against him. And maybe you feel like you've been in the crucible before. And God, maybe God has you in such a place tonight where he's working on you. Maybe he has allowed your business to fail. Maybe he has allowed difficulties in life to come by. Even though you have been clean, Job was righteous, you see. Now, if you're living in sin and you know you're living in sin and these things come upon you, don't come to me. Go to God and get right with God. Clean up your lives. What I'm talking about, let me say, I'm hoping every one of you has everything in your past cleaned up. And if not, I pray, gird up your loins tonight like a man and do something about it. There's more God wants to do. Alright, Job. His wife said, curse God and die, but he's sinned not with his lips. Job was able. He was fine. It wasn't material goods. Hurting, deep body pain, but he still stood steadfast. But you know where he failed? Here comes three friends and they sit down and they mourn with him over his deep poverty and the things that happened with him. And then, they begin to talk. Job begins to talk and they begin to talk. And these three friends, yes, the Bible calls them his friends. And they basically assassinate his character. Chapter after chapter after chapter after chapter. Job, surely you must have sinned. Job, you're surely guilty. You've done something wrong. And all along they went over and over again, first the one, Elihu, tried to convince Job, Job, you've done something wrong. These things don't happen to the righteous. Surely you have sinned. And the three friends, one after the other, over and over again. And Job, what was his response? Self-defense, self-justification, their onslaughts, their attacks against his character. Well, you might be able to handle it when your finances go down. You might even be able to struggle through it when your wife turns up against you or something. But what if your friends come to you and begin to talk about your character? This is where it really hurts. Someone comes to you and says, Brother, what about, you know, you really have a need in this area in your life. No, I don't. No, I don't. Job, in a sense, through all those chapters, he had his defense set up all around him. It's like he had this hedge built around him and these men sitting outside the hedge and they're shooting, they're trying to shoot it across the hedge, you know, and Job just kind of puts the hedge up in that place and then when they stop shooting, he sticks his head out across it and he starts talking to them again. And as they start talking, he ducks back down, you know, he just kind of protects himself behind his hedge. I don't know if you're here today with a hedge or not. Maybe you came to this leadership seminar kind of hurting a little bit. You know, you're kind of like this. You don't want anyone to really get really close. It's too painful. That's what was happening with Job. Job was not a broken man at that place. And the question I have to you tonight, are you still resisting God? Or can you see, can you see, when you look at Job, it's not so hard to see God's hand, is it? Is it God's hand that is working in my life? Through my friends. The difficulty you're facing, my brother and my sister. Isn't it God's hand? Isn't it God's hand that is allowing you to be tempted, to be buffeted, to be persecuted, to be cast down? Isn't it God's hand? Doesn't God have a purpose in it? Huh? But what am I doing with it? When I'm in the middle of that, what's my response? What is my response when I'm in the middle of it? You know, it's his fault. It's her fault. But he did this. But, you know, it's self-justification, isn't it? I'm not willing to look. I can't see it. But neither am I willing to look at it when my brother tries to help me see it. You're not broken. You're not a broken man. Brokenness, it may take five or ten years, my brother, until God has you in a place like a chess player so you can't move anymore. And I see God working that chessboard. You know, he keeps moving this piece and he keeps moving this piece around and you keep wiggling around this way and you wiggle around this way and you try to get away here but then he checks you over here and then you move over here and he checks you over here until finally you can't move. And God in His mercy, God in His mercy shows you who you really are. Shows you your old selfish nature. Shows you how absolutely ugly and vile you are. David expressed that. He said, Oh, I'm but a worm. God begins to talk to Job in chapter 40. Turn there. Actually, it's in chapter 38. The Lord answered Job after these three men had failed. They failed to convince Job of his need. And the Lord begins to speak. Actually, it was four men who spoke there. The Lord answered Job out of the world and said, Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Who is this that is counseling without any knowledge? Who is it, Job? Gird up now thy loins like a man for I will demand of thee and answer thou me. I'm so blessed with the preaching of the Word this week and they said, This book demands a response. And I've heard it many times that you can read through a heathen man who doesn't know Jesus Christ. He doesn't know the Gospels. When he picks up a new testament for the first time, he can read through Matthew and see the king in his beauty. He can read through Mark and see what he did. And he can read through Luke and see the humanity of Christ there. But when it comes to John, the book of John, it demands a response over and over and over again. It's, Do you believe? Do you believe? He that believeth. It demands a response. And I've heard the testimony of a man say, But when I got the book of John, I had to do something with it. I could no longer just stand there. I had to make a decision. This book demands a response. And God here is working in Job's life and He's demanding a response from Job. Job, I want you, gird up your loins now. Gird up your loins now like a man. Not like a woman. I remember a story my grandmother had. Her mother, which my great-grandmother, in our background, Amish people, it was the custom. Of course, they didn't wash their clothes every day. You'd wear your clothes for a full week and then wash them by hand. It's like the scent team found out in Africa. They said the first week after they were there, there was mountains of clothing to wash and these guys had to wash by hand. You know, by the last week they were there, they had very few clothes to wash. And so, if you don't have a washing machine, you soon wear your clothes a lot longer. And so, my great-grandmother, as was the custom there, they wore long dresses and underneath their long dresses they wore the undergarment. And it was the custom that they would take their dress and they would pick up the outer garment there and pin it up here at the waist, exposing their undergarment. And that was their working style. That was their working... That's how they did their work in the garden. When great-grandmother would go out in the garden, she would pull up her dress, gird it up, you might say, and she'd go to work in the garden. Why did she do that, you might say? It's because when company would come, she could let down the outer fold of her dress and she had a nice, clean dress. But Job is... God is saying to Job, I want the response from you. Gird up now thy loins like a man. Be a man, Job. Face your needs. Face everything that you... Look at yourself, Job. Be a man. That's what God is saying. Where were you, Job? And Job has just come through this grueling time with these men. And they're trying to convince him of his needs. They're trying to show him. They wish that somehow he could see what they see. And God is on His throne. God in His mercy comes to Job and says, Job, where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? You're so smart, Job. Declare if thou hast understanding. Where were you when I did this? Who has laid the measures thereof? If thou knowest that, tell me. For who sets the line upon it? I'm demanding of you, Job. I want an answer from you. You seem to have all the answers you see. Whereupon are the foundations of the earth fastened? When the morning stars sang together, where were you? When I made the cloud garment and so forth. He goes on and on. Verse 16. Hast thou entered into the springs of the sea? Hast thou walked in the search of the depth? Have the gates of death been opened to thee? Hast thou seen the doors of the shadows of death? Job, are you listening? Hast thou perceived the breadth of the earth? Declare if thou knowest it. God is speaking. Brothers and sisters, God is speaking. Are you listening this week? Oh, the tragedy. Woe unto me if I don't get it this week. If I don't rise up, if I don't gird up my loins and take something, do something with what I've been getting this week. Woe is me. Woe to my family. Woe to my sons. But oh, woe is me if I don't gird up my loins when God is speaking and I'm not listening. At the reign of Father, who begotten the drops of dew, out of whose womb came the ice, the hoary frost of heaven, who hath gendered it? Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, loose the bands of Orion and so forth? Do you know the time of the wild goats and the heinous, the calves? Can you number their months and so forth? God is just opening. There's Job. He's listening. He's been sitting there kind of behind his head for a long time. But God is working. God is speaking. And I just think Job's head would go down a little bit more and his head would go down a little bit more as he began to realize who God is. God's not finished. Chapter 40. The Lord answered Job and said, Actually, let's look at 39, verse 26. Doth the hawk fly by thy wisdom? Stretch her wings toward the south? Doth the eagle mount up at thy command and make her nest on high? More of the Lord answered Job in chapter 40. Shall he that contendeth with the Almighty instruct him? He that reproveth God. Let him answer. Do you know better than God? Do you know better than God? Job answered the Lord and said, Behold, I am vile. What shall I answer thee? I will lay my hand on my mouth. Once have I spoken, but I will not answer. Yea, twice, but I will proceed no further. And he lays his hands upon his mouth. But God is not finished. He says it again. Gird up thy loins now, like a man. What is he trying to say? He said, Job, listen carefully. I'm working in your life, but you don't even see it yet. You're just resisting what I'm trying to do. Job, gird up now thy loins and be a man. I would amend thee to throw thou unto me. Wilt thou disannul my judgment? Wilt thou condemn me, that thou mayest be righteous? O, werest thou self-righteous at times? Hast thou an arm like God? Canst thou thunder with a voice like him? Verse 12. Look on everyone that is proud. Job, I want you to look at someone who's proud. Can you abase him? Can you bring that person down to humility? Job, have you ever tried to work pride out of someone? Who's he talking about? He's talking about Job. If you can do those things, Job. Verse 14. Then will I also confess unto thee that thy own right hand can save thee. Brothers and sisters, we need a revelation of God. We need a revelation of who God is. And we need a revelation of what God sees in me. Then will I confess unto thee that thy own right hand can save thee. What is God saying? He's trying to get something across to Job. You're not listening, Job. What more can I do? O, Lord, would you open our eyes tonight. Would you grant us a revelation of who we are. He speaks of the behomoth. He takes what I believe must have been the biggest animal that was around at that time. Speaks of behomoth there to the end of chapter 40. Chapter 41, he speaks of the Leviathan. Maybe the same beast. I don't know. But look at it. Chapter 41. Canst thou draw out Leviathan with a hook? Or his tongue with a corb, which thou let us down? Canst thou put a hook in his nose or bore his jaw through the thorn? I think of a pet. We had a little cocker spaniel at home. We put him on a leash. And we take him with us. You know? He's my pet. I like this guy. Job, can you take this Leviathan, this behomoth? Can you bore a hole through his nose and put a leash on him and take him with you? Look at the Scriptures. Will he make many supplications unto thee? Job, who are you? You must be God. Will this behomoth, will this Leviathan, will he make supplications to thee? Will he worship you? Will he speak soft words to thee? Will he make a covenant with thee? Will thou take him for a servant forever? Look at this. He's got a pet on a leash. God is showing this to him. Will thou play with him as with a bird? Or will thou bind him for thy maidens? Shall thy companions make a banquet for him? Shall they part him among the merchants? This is a toy for you, Job. Is it not? God is challenging Job. Canst thou fill his skin with barbed irons? Or his head with fish spears? Lay thine hand upon him. And look at this, verse 8. Remember the battle. What's he talking about? Evidently, Job had a battle with Leviathan in the past. And he lost. Remember the battle, Job. Remember! And do no more. Job, I want you to be finished. I want you to be done. I want you to just lay it all aside. Job, can't you see? Can't you see who you really are? Behold, the hope of him is in vain. You'll never tame this one, Job. You'll never tame him. Shall not one be cast down even at the sight of him? This must be one of the biggest dinosaurs ever. And he's saying, Job, don't men fall down at the sight of this thing. Just at the sight of it, men fall in fear of this huge animal. Verse 10. None is so fierce. There's no man so fierce that dare stir him up. No. There is... Who then is able to stand before me? Job, why are you still standing? Why are you still standing before me? When at the sight of this Leviathan, men fall down in fear, and no one, no one is so brave, no one is so fierce, that when that Leviathan is sleeping, that they would dare to raise him up, dare to stir him up, but... Job, you'll fall down in front of that big beast, but how come you're still standing in front of me? Job, you're not seeing it right. You're not seeing it right. You're not seeing who I am. You're not seeing who you are. Are you still standing? And he goes on, and he continues to describe that Behomoth. Chapter 42. The Lord. Job answered the Lord. I know that dolphins do everything, and that no thought can be withholden from Thee. Who is He that hath counseled without knowledge? He's saying, OK, I acknowledge God. You are God. And I've been speaking unwisely. It's because I didn't recognize it, because I didn't have knowledge, therefore have I uttered that I understood not, things to wonderful me, for me which I knew not. OK, Job, his head is going down. He's saying, OK, God, yeah, I'm listening. I'm listening, yeah. I've said things that I didn't know anything about. I'm sorry. That's the picture I get there. It seems like God is speaking in verse 4. I'm not sure. Here I beseech Thee, and I will speak. I will demand of Thee, and declare Thou unto me. God is again calling Job. Job, I want an answer. I want a response. What are you going to do with it? And Job responds, and he said, I have heard of Thee by the hearing of my ear, but now my eye seeth Thee. Oh, that we could say that. Oh, that you could say that tonight. I've heard about You, Lord, but now my eyes see. And maybe you're here tonight, and you can identify with an unsanctified life. You know there are issues in your life. You know. Maybe you recognize that there's open doors in your heart. Or maybe you recognize the fruit of sin in your children. And you wonder why your child at two years of age is so violent, uncontrollable, and says things like, kill Jesus. At two years old, something's wrong. Something's deeply wrong. Many other things. Are you sanctified? Have you laid it all out? Have you ever come and laid everything to the Lord and offered, and this is, consecration is an offering. You're simply saying, Lord, I'm laying it all out. And then you give the Lord the right to do whatever He wants to do in every area of your life, including your character. Including working you over like Job was worked over. Are you open to your brothers? Who see things in your life that you can't see? They are so blinded by the devil they cannot see. 2 Corinthians 4, verse 3. My eyes have been opened, but only partially. I don't even know the things I cannot see. It's true. I can only see that which I can see. Are there things that you can see tonight? Just make your way up here. God has spoken. You make your way up here and lay it out to the Lord and open up your whole life, whole area. And it's only when you, I shouldn't say only then, but certainly, if there's things in the back of your life, don't expect to go on with God very far. But once you get totally clean and totally whole, all your sins that you know are taken care of, restitution is made and everything like that, then you can go on and you can consecrate your life fully holy to God. And then God will begin to work deeply in your life in the areas that you can't see. Job could not see. If our gospel be hidden, it's hidden to them that are lost. In whom the God of this world hath blinded, the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, which is an image of God, should shine to them, and so forth. But they're blinded. Satan, is the God of this world, has blinded their minds, lest the gospel come to them. But has he only blinded the minds of the unsaved? They're blinded by the devil. They cannot see. My eyes have been opened, partially. I don't even know the things I can't see. There needs to be a revelation. And I have faith that when you come with a bowed heart, and you're willing to open it up, God will begin to reveal to you the hidden things deep in your heart and life. I beg you, fathers, mothers, this is not just the leaders, not just men's seminar tonight. This is for the sisters. This is for the young ladies, likewise. Have you been saved? What about being sanctified of everything? And then, have you ever laid it all out? And allowed God to begin to work towards that area, towards that place of brokenness. You see, this follows consecration. Once you consecrate yourself, and you give God the right to do whatever it takes to be a broken, humble vessel in His hand, He'll begin to work. And He'll try to bring you like that chessboard, the place where you can't move. And you will fall on your face like Job, like Ezekiel, like Isaiah, like John on the island of Patmos. When there's a revelation, let's stand for prayer. Father, we commit this Word of God into Your hand, this message. I pray, Father, that somehow You would work so in the hearts of us men, including myself, that we could see a little bit more of what You see. Father, if I don't see clearly by this weekend, I'm afraid I'm going to miss it, Lord. I'm afraid I'm going to miss it. And woe, woe unto me if I miss it this week. I know, Lord, that I stand at a crossroads. I believe our churches may be standing at a crossroads. And woe, woe, if we don't get it this week. With our sons, Father, I pray, receive all glory, be glorified tonight in Jesus' name. Do we have a psalm, a psalm leader? Just mind the Lord. 228. 228. I would really encourage you, if you have responded, if God has spoken to your heart, don't just come up to the altar and go back to your seat after a short prayer. Go back to the prayer room. Open up your heart. Begin to confess and repent. Have someone there help you. Let someone else see who you are. Shall we sing? Just as I am without one plea, but that Thy blood was shed for me, and that Thou bidst me come to Thee, O Lamb of God, I come, I come. Just as I am, and waiting not to rid my soul of one dark blot, to Thee whose blood can cleanse each spot, O Lamb of God, I come, I come. Gird up now thy loins like a man. I heard a lot about being a man. So many of us men, we're too relaxed. We don't really care. Oh, gird up your loins now like a man. Let's sing one more verse. We're not going to wait long. Just as I am, though tossed about with many a conflict, many a doubt, life lives within and falls with us. Those of you who have responded, why don't you make your way back to the prayer rooms, go out the side doors. And we'd like to have some more counselors. If you're able to counsel, make your way back there. You can go out both sides here. Let's re-sing another verse or two. If God has spoken to your heart, you can make your way back there. Just as I am poor, wretched, blind, sighs, riches, healing of the mind, yea, all I need is Thee. I find no land of God. I come, I come. I want to just make one thing clear. You might not be able to exactly know clearly where you're at. I'm not saying it has to be in this order. I want to make that clear. But don't stop.