In this sermon, the pastor emphasizes the importance of continuous growth in the Christian faith. He highlights the tendency of some Christians to reach a certain point in their spiritual journey and then become stagnant or even regress. However, the pastor reminds the congregation that Jesus values their growth and progress, not just their initial commitment. He encourages them to serve others as a means of growing in love and faith. The pastor also emphasizes the need for Christians to be vigilant in their beliefs and actions, as what they believe will ultimately impact how they live.

I've been doing a series, for those of you visiting on, which is unusual for Tuesday nights, I've never done it, and I don't want to go long on this one, even though to the smallest town goes the longest letter. There's seven cities, seven churches that Jesus wrote to in the book of Revelation, and the name of this series is Love Letters from Our Lord, the love letters of Jesus. They're all love letters because Jesus is love, God is love, so anything he writes is love, amen? Even when there's warnings, even when there's, watch it, whether it's commendation or warning, it's always love, just like a mother loves her child and says, don't play with those scissors. The child thinks that they're fun, the mother knows better. We sometimes play with things that are very, very dangerous, and the Lord who knows better warns us, not because he wants to ruin our lives, because he wants to save us from a lot of headache and harm, destruction. The first letter was written to the church at Ephesus, the second letter was written to the church in Smyrna, that was a difficult letter, they were under such persecution. Last week we learned about the church that was in Pergamum. I love to say that word, say it with me, Pergamum. A little louder, everyone, Pergamum. And now this church is the third church at Thyatira, T-H-Y-A-T-I-R-A. So, this was the smallest town of all the seven, but it was a place of, it's by the way, the place where Lydia in the New Testament, who worked with Paul after she was converted, came from. And she worked with dyed fabric, she sold dyed fabrics. And some of the research has proven, or has found out that Thyatira, before we see the letter that was written to the church there, we don't know how the church was founded, maybe by some of the labors of Paul or one of his converts. But this fourth church that we're talking about was famous for its gills, or a word we would use, or unions, gills, but they were only by trade. So there would be a carpenter's guild, all carpenters had to kind of belong to it. And then people who worked with fabric, and people who sewed, and people who did another kind of job, all the merchants who made pottery, they all belonged to a guild, like we would call a union. But the gills were the main social function, in other words, the main thing that was happening in Thyatira was the gills. It was divided not by middle class, upper class, black, white, and all of that stuff, but the social stratum was along the lines of the gills. Now all the gills had a god that they identified with. There were multitudes of gods in the Roman Empire, thousands, so this was difficult for a Christian because whatever job you had, and whatever guild you were in, there was a god connected to the union you were in. Wasn't like the AFL-CIO here, or Local 2, or all of that, or the UFT, there was a god. And there were celebrations for the god, where food, which had been offered to the god, was then eaten, and in all the celebrations, idols, idol celebrations, there was always the hint or outright immorality. There was looseness, sexual immorality. So now you get converted, and you're in Thyatira, and whatever you do for a living, what do you do? You're in a union, you're in a guild, those are the people that are your peers, those are the people you interact with, and they have a god, and they have their feasts, and what are you gonna do? That's just the background that we know for sure about Thyatira. Much of this letter is mysterious, and maybe will never be known until we get to heaven. I certainly can't say that I understand for sure, and would tell you this is what all this means, because in the book of Revelation, there's so much symbolism, and there's words that are used not in a literal sense, but in a symbolic sense, and yet other times, there are words that are used to be used in a literal sense. So how do you divide that? It's very difficult sometimes. And we're not living 2,000 years ago, and we're not living in Thyatira, so we don't know what was happening in that church. And this was a great church. Of all the churches that are complimented, this right along with Ephesus has some of the strongest compliments from the Lord Jesus Christ about a church, and when Jesus compliments your church, you got something cooking. How many say amen? I mean, when another person says, I like your church, that's one thing. When Jesus says, the one whose eyes are like fire, as we're gonna find, he sees everything, and he says, I know this, and then he commends them. Let's see what he said. It's the longest letter. I'm not gonna talk about all of it, because I already told you, I don't understand what some of it means. For sure, I know different views, but I want you to focus in on it, okay? To the angel of the church in Thyatira, write, these are the words of the Son of God whose eyes are like blazing fire. That means he sees everything, and whose feet are like burnished bronze. That bronze usually means judgment. It's a symbol of judgment, and by the way, the words like blazing fire, eyes are like blazing fire, and feet are burnished bronze, that's from the original chapter one picture that John had, vision of Jesus Christ, so there's a repetition. I know your deeds. That doesn't mean positive or negative. It just says, I know your deeds, and now he explains them. Your love and your faith. Your service and your perseverance. Notice what came out of love, service. When you love, you serve. What comes out of faith, perseverance. When you trust, you hang in there. And that you are now doing more than you did at first, so just stay there for a second. Think of that compliment. Jesus Christ says, I know how much you love, not only love for me, but love for others. In fact, you love me so much, and you love people so much, you serve, and I know your faith in me, and you know how strong your faith is in me? You endure all kinds of stuff, and you hang in. You have perseverance, and you know what? It's not like you're not growing. It's not like you're going down. You're going up. You're doing more now than you did at the beginning. Pretty good church, wouldn't you say? Wouldn't that be a great testimony of any church? Like they would say about a pastor. Pastor Simba's church was like that. I would go, praise God. But here's the negative side. Nevertheless, I have this against you. You tolerate that woman, Jezebel. Now, who's Jezebel? We know who Jezebel is from the Old Testament. Who was she the wife of? Anybody remember? King who? Ahab, right? And she was a dilly, remember? She was wicked. She persecuted. In fact, that's what Najae was alluding to tonight about Elijah. You tolerate. Notice, you don't endorse her. You don't follow her teachings. What do you do? Just tolerate. You tolerate that woman, Jezebel. Obviously, she's in the church. Who calls herself a prophetess. By her teaching, she misleads my servants. That's not pastors or leaders. That's servants as used for the followers of Christ. She misleads my servants into sexual immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols. Now, let me just stop there for a second. Some people think that her teaching was this, kind of like an antinomianism. Nothing's wrong. There's no law. And she was teaching this. Look, you're in your guilds. You don't want to lose your job by not going with the flow of the guild. So go to their feasts. I know the food is dedicated to idols. I know the demons are behind the idols. And I know a lot of things get wild and they start to party. But you can do it too because God is only interested in your spirit. What you do with your body doesn't matter. That's what some of the, and that was a teaching that attacked the early church and is still going on today in certain parts of the world. I know a man in Uruguay who threw away his ministry, starting having multiple affairs and multiplying wives, pastoring a large church, praying for the sick, talking about Jesus. And when he was confronted many, many, many, many years ago by my late father-in-law, he said, listen, my spirit is gonna be saved so God doesn't care what I do with my body. My soul is gonna be saved. So that's a teaching from Satan, amen? And Jezebel, whether whoever she was, a literal person, or it's a code name for who they would know that woman is, and she's like Jezebel because she's misleading the people like Jezebel was a Phoenician who married an Israelite king, Ahab, and pulled the people away into idol worship. Well, there was someone in the church doing that. And the church leadership tolerated it. They didn't endorse it. Not everybody was involved in it, but they tolerated it. Now, even as wicked as she was, look how gracious Jesus is. I've given her time to what? Repent. What does that mean? Turn around. Admit it's wrong. Say it's wrong. Hate it. Run from it. Say, Jesus, have mercy on me. I've given her time to repent of her immorality, but she is unwilling. See, some people, just flat out, are unwilling to repent. That comes from Jesus. That doesn't come from me or someone else. Jesus is saying, I gave her space, I gave her time, but she's unwilling to repent. She's hardening and getting harder and harder. So I will cast her, what this exactly means, I am not sure. So I will cast her on the bed of suffering, and I will make those who commit adultery with her suffer intensely unless they repent of her ways. Notice, they're following her ways. Now, some people say that could be literal adultery, literal fornication, which is any sexual immorality outside of marriage. Any sexual contact outside of marriage is called fornication. Jesus said, I'm gonna judge that. In the lake of fire are fornicators, liars, murderers. No, but everyone does that. In the lake of fire are fornicators, liars, idolaters. Or it could mean spiritual adultery, which means to love other gods more than you love Christ. It seems here that there's something literal about it and also maybe something symbolic about it. I will strike her children dead. I have no idea what that means, literal children or followers. They're divided, Christians are divided what that means. Then all the churches will know that I am he who searches hearts and minds, and I will repay each of you according to your deeds. Boy, Jesus is telling it like it is, amen? I will repay each of you according to your deeds. Your faith in me and your devotion to me will show by the lifestyle you have, not perfection, because then nobody would be with the Lord, but the drift of your life, the desire of your heart. David was a man after God's own heart. He made horrible mistakes. He not only committed adultery, which other people did in the Bible, but he killed the husband of the woman he did, and yet the Lord says he had a heart after my own heart, because God doesn't judge you by the mistake you make, but God judges you by the heart that cries out for mercy. Come on, let's all put our hands together and say amen to that. Can we celebrate God's mercy and how he looks at us? Now I say to the rest of you in Thyatira, to you who do not hold to her teaching and have not learned Satan's so-called deep secrets, that probably means she claims to be a prophetess. She claims to be giving revelations from God, and she says it's a deep secret. It is, but it's Satan's deep secret. That's probably how that is used, and that's how some translations have it. Oh yeah, she's giving you deep secrets. It's Satan's deep secrets. I will not impose any further burden on you, those of you who have not learned all this junk that she's spouting. Only hold on to what you have until I come. Only hold on to what you have. Whatever you have from God, hold on to it until Christ comes again. Don't let somebody rip you off and steal your faith, your love, the truth that's in your heart. To him who overcomes and does my will to the end, I will give authority over the nations. And then there's a quote from Psalm 2 about the Messiah. Psalm 1 is about the law of God. Blessed is the man who walketh right, but his delight is in. Psalm 2 is a messianic. It talks about what God has promised to the Messiah. He will rule over them with an iron scepter. He will dash them to pieces like pottery, just as I have received authority from my Father. So to the person who overcomes, when I rule and reign, you will rule and reign with me. When I rule and reign, my people will rule and reign with me. That's what the New Testament promises. We will rule and reign with Christ in ways we cannot fathom, but it's gonna be beautiful. Might be beautiful. We could maybe be in charge of countries. Be in charge of Trinidad. No, there's gonna be a new heaven and a new earth. We're gonna rule and reign somehow, though, with Christ. And then finally, I will also give him the morning star, which is Christ. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to church. To him who overcomes and does my will to the end. So this was a great church, great church, and it shows that great churches can have problems, that nothing's perfect, it seems. And this church, which was so commendable, love, faith, growing, service, endurance, getting stronger by the year, leadership was doing something right in that church, but it was doing something wrong. That's why you never worship any leader. You never worship any pastor. You never worship anybody called bishop, apostle, or anything else. You only worship Jesus. Come on, let's all agree on that. You pray, you pray for leaders because they're apt to make mistakes. So the problem was they tolerated a woman in the church whose name was not, no Christians or Jews who knew the Old Testament would ever name somebody Jezebel. Maybe it's a code name. Some people think, you know, it stands for that teaching, but it seems like it's too personal to stand for teaching. And what was Jezebel doing? She was claiming not to be a devil. She was claiming to be a prophetess. She had the word of the Lord. She had a deeper word of the Lord than what the church was teaching. She was giving the people more freedom and saying, don't let the leaders bring you under this yoke of bondage of law and rules and regulations. You gotta be free. You gotta go with the flow. And with these gills possibly, you gotta be part of the people. You can't be some outsider, you know, dinosaur, weird, holy roller person. You gotta go with the flow. Even to the point of you go to their idolatrous feasts and you eat that meat sacrifice to idols. And when things start to get a little hot and heavy, you can join in because remember, you belong to God, God loves you, and in the end, he's gonna take care of everything. Is that not a teaching, some form of which is around today? Is it not? Now, the church was warned, forget Christ's judgment on all of that, we don't need to go into that. I wanna just close with this. Christ's appeal is this, to all the believers in Thyatira, and this is repeated in all the letters, along with he that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit is saying. He also says this, to the person who overcomes, I will give such and such. You'll get a crown, you'll get a reward. You'll sit with me on my throne. You'll rule and reign with Christ. You'll receive the morning star. All the promises are given to the person who overcomes. Well, overcome speaks of obstacles, it speaks of enemies. When you win a basketball game, it's hard against a good team because you have to overcome their height, their players, the skill that they have. So at the end of the game, you're sweaty, but you're happy because you won, because you overcame. A runner has to overcome pain, tiredness, if he's running a long distance. So Jesus is saying, remember now, there's a reward to the person who overcomes. And Christ wants us more than we wanna be. How many of you here wanna be an overcomer? Right to the end, wave your hand at me. You wanna be an overcomer. Not go to church, I'm talking about overcomer. Overcome what? The world, the flesh, the devil, false prophets, false prophetesses, weird religion, no religion, atheism, agnosticism. You gotta overcome all these things. How many, since you've been serving the Lord, you've had some battles, maybe overcoming discouragement, overcoming depression, overcoming a family who fought you, overcoming, how many here today can say, even to this day, God's helped you overcome a lot of stuff. Wave your hand at me, wave your hand at me. All right, so we know the battle, right? That's why Christianity is termed as what? A race and a fight. I have fought a good what? I have finished the race or the course, right? So you have to overcome. The thing I want most for you, because God's put his love in for me, and I told some pastors that are visiting here that I have the best congregation in the whole world. I don't think there's any people like you, and I'm not saying that because I'm the pastor. I feel that before Almighty God. But what I want for you is that you overcome so that together we're walking on the streets of gold. We're in heaven together. There must be a battle to this, or else the Bible wouldn't say, to him who overcomes. The hint is not everyone overcomes. Am I right? If the promise is to him who overcomes, the implication is what? Make sure you overcome. Not everyone who starts the race finishes. The only one who gets the crown is the one who finishes the race. So to him who overcomes. I want them to overcome. Now we're all made differently. Everyone here is made differently, and what the devil uses to try to drag you down is different than what he uses to drag me down, right? But that's why every time we gather, we got to encourage each other because you don't know the battle someone's going through, and you got to pray, God, help them to overcome. Can we put our hands together? Help these young people from Mississippi, from Houston, overcome. What does it matter what name they are? Baptist, Assembly of God, Presbyterian, Lutheran. These names don't exist to God. He's got his people, and Jesus is saying, I want you to overcome. Now make sure you overcome, and he wants us to overcome more than we want to overcome. Jesus is not sitting there saying, now I hope you overcome. He's saying, I've given you my word. I've given you my son. I gave my life, Jesus is saying. I've given you my blood. I've given you my spirit. Now make sure you overcome. Keep your hand in my hand. Fight off the distractions. Don't feel sorry for yourself. Don't look down and say, woe is me, because that's like a whistle to the devil to come. Say, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Come on, can we say that together? Amen. Oh, Pastor Cimbala, but it's hard. Oh, is it so hard? How about people who are giving their life for Christ? How about the people I spoke to in Hong Kong from mainland China, half of whom had been in jail? You have it hard. Have you been in jail? Have you been in jail for Christ? How about our friends that we're helping there in Ethiopia, the minister who got shot, now the widow's there? Have you given your life yet for Christ? Have you lost your husband to an assassin's bullet? So no matter how bad we have it, someone has it worse. So we shouldn't be having a pity party. We should be saying, Lord, every day, help me to overcome. Come on, can we say that together? Every day, Lord, give me the grace to overcome. Now, are there any secrets in this letter how to overcome? I think there are. First of all, you've got to overcome. You've got to realize this. What you believe will affect how you live. The people who got polluted by Jezebel's teaching, guess what? They started to let it all hang out, and now they're in trouble, because the Lord sees everything. In case anybody here think you've got something going on that no one knows about, wake up. Wake up. The Lord sees everything. Now, that's an awesome fact, and that's a happy fact. Just depends how you look at it. It's awesome in the sense that there are no secrets, and be sure your sins will find you out. It's a happy fact that no matter what we're going through, the Lord sees exactly what we're going through. And when people are mean, and people are attacking us, and our hearts are right with the Lord, the Lord, no matter what mistakes we've made, the Lord sees everything and says, I will never leave you nor forsake you. I'm going to be with you to the end. Come on. We say amen to that. So that sentence is a double-edged sword. To the person who doesn't want to live right, ooh, it'll cut you. Cut you right open. Reveal your heart to you, hopefully. But to the person who's hanging on and says, I love Jesus, just know this. He sees everything. But what we believe will affect. So that's how we live. That's why you've got to know your Bible. You've got to know what you believe. You've got to come to church and listen to the preacher, whoever the preacher is. You've got to read godly books. You've got to read your word. You've got to, God, teach me your word. How will you know a counterfeit unless you know the real? How would you know that the Jezebel is talking smack unless you know what the word of God says? How did she get away? She didn't get everyone in the church. Most didn't go her way. But she got a few people who must have been naive and she made it like a prophecy. She probably maybe went into some kind of ecstasy and maybe prophesied the Lord was saying to you, no matter whoever prophesies to you, listen to it, be reverent, listen, it could be God. And then you check out everything with the word of God. And you check it with other people. Anyone wants to only speak over you in a private place? You say, no, I want you to do this in front of people. You have a word for me? I want you to come to Deacon Edwards here. I want you to give that word. Oh no, I can't do it in front of Deacon Edwards. Then I don't want to receive it. No private little words from me. Whatever you say, say in the light. That's a good word. Don't listen to people who only want to talk to you in the secret. Anyone who has something from God is not afraid to come in the light. Only somebody nasty wants to stay in the dark. Come on, let's say amen. So what you believe, what I believe, is gonna affect how I live. So let's make sure what's in our head is right, what's in our heart is right, truth. Oh, your word is truth. I love your word, Lord. I've been reading one verse of Psalm 119 a day beside my other reading, just focusing on one. It's so full of truth. Number two, be very careful what you tolerate. This church had to be rebuked by the Lord, not because of evil that they propagated. There was no false teaching in the church. There was no false teaching in that church by the leadership, but they tolerated Jezebel. What does that mean to us? We can never tolerate something in our lives that's not of God. The moment you make a treaty with some wrong thought, some wrong attitude, some unforgiveness, some racist thought, the minute you get some lustful thought and you accept it and you tolerate it and say, nobody will know, so I'll just keep that away here. I'm not gonna deal with it. That's where trouble will come. Never tolerate, we can't tolerate anything. Well, tell me something. I had my grandson at my house yesterday, baby Levi. Do you think when he lifts up anything to put in his mouth, you don't think we're all running to see what he's putting in his mouth? You think I'm gonna tolerate him putting something bad in his mouth? Do you think I'm gonna tolerate anything going in that little mouth, right? Never. By the way, they caught him the other day. He ate a nickel. So I told Pastor Petri, he ate a nickel. He said, listen, he's done that before. He was going through a stage where anything on the floor, he was just popping in there. He said, I think he has about $1.70 somewhere wrapped up in his stomach there. My goodness. Little guy. Today, if you're here and God is speaking to you, you're tolerating something. You're tolerating a relationship maybe. It's not of God and you know it, but you're tolerating it. You're not going all the way, but you're not stepping back. You're tolerating it. It's not a gun. Gonna pull you down. Everything begins by tolerating something that's not of God. And then once it's tolerated, it gets its own momentum. Come on, do I get a witness here? Gets its own momentum. And then once that momentum is going, you try to put up your hand and stop it. It's like a train coming down the tracks. So you wanna be an overcomer? Remember, su cabeza, what goes in your head, what you believe is gonna affect how you live. Believe the truth. What's ever as lovely, what's ever as pure, think on these things. Number two, tolerating. They call Christians intolerant. Some people say, I don't wanna be a Christian, they're so intolerant. We are very intolerant. We are very intolerant. We will not tolerate the devil. How many say amen? We don't wanna tolerate sin. But how are parents when they raise their children, do they tolerate anything? Oh yeah, you're a molester of children? Come and play with my children. No, you don't tolerate a lot of things. You're strict. Don't tolerate Jezebel, whatever form she might take in your life. And lastly, the best way to be an overcomer is not only remember those first two things, what you believe, what you ponder, what you trust in. Number two, you don't tolerate things. May the Holy Spirit apply that word today. I don't wanna get past it here because maybe God brought you in today. He loves you so much, you're tolerating anger right now in you. You're very angry. But you're making excuses to justify your anger. But the Bible says, be angry and don't sin. Don't let the sun go down on your anger. The anger of man or woman does not work the righteousness of God. The anger's gonna eat you up. You can't tolerate it. But you don't know what happened. I don't know, but I know one thing about anger, it'll kill you. See how we can tolerate things, we justify them. Lastly, the most important thing is you gotta be active and growing. This church was an overcoming church for the most part because it had love for God and love for people. Whenever you love God, you love people. If you don't love people, you don't really love God. Because how can you love God who you've never seen and not love your brother who's right in front of you? So everyone who loves God loves people and they wanna serve people. When you love someone, you wanna serve them. And they not only had love that served, they also had love that served. Why do you think the prayer band comes and prays for your requests and other people's requests? They love God and that's their avenue of service. Why do you think people clean the building when the service is over tonight, the keepers of God's house? Why do you think people work with children, special needs kids? Very, very difficult. Why do people go to Royal Family Kids Camp? Why do people go on mission trips at their own expense? My brother Steve over here, the guy's been all over the world paying out of his own pocket to go and minister to people he's never seen before. Why would he do that? Because God's put love inside of him. And I wanna say to all of you, you wanna grow, then serve people and grow in that service. Notice what this church in both love and faith was doing. It was growing. If Christianity doesn't grow, it goes backwards. There's no holding pattern. And some of you, I shouldn't say this to you, you're here on a Tuesday night in the prayer meeting, but remember this, all of us. Whatever ability God has given you, whatever love and faith he's given, serve somebody, grow, move ahead. It's like riding a bike, what one preacher said. You can't ride a bike if you're standing still. The only way you can ride a bike and balance on a two-wheeler is to be moving. That's how Christianity, you gotta move ahead. You gotta go from glory to glory and from faith to faith. The minute you stop and say, you know what, I've had a good run, I've served the Lord, but now I'm at the, I hear this all my life. Relatives of mine have bitten the dust. Some of them are in the grave now. And when I knew them as a kid, they were on fire, and then they came to a place where I did that before. Hey, I've been there, I've done that. Now it's time for me to rest. No, there's no time to rest. We got heaven to rest, got all eternity to rest. Now we gotta serve. Now we gotta endure. Now we gotta serve other people. Now we gotta bless other people. Now we gotta grow from whatever we were doing. This church, Jesus said, your works now are greater than when you started, and that's very unusual as I close with people. You study the life of most Christians. They start out, they grow in the Lord, they reach a certain point, and then unfortunately, they're not like Pastor Ware. They're not like people like that. They go, and then they go into semi-retirement spiritually. You know, less prayer, less attendance at church, less service, but Jesus said, no, the great thing about you is what you did at the beginning, it's even more now. You're not going backwards, you're going greater. And I wonder how many Christians that can be said about. Wonder if the Lord can say that about all of us here today. I want him to say that about all of us, and as a church. You're doing more now. Than you did at the beginning. How about you? See, if you want to overcome, you got to be crazy for Jesus. You got to be a lunatic. One of my last conversations with my friend, Brother Dave Wilkerson, were these my last words with him? I was speaking in Colorado Springs. He was there in the green room after the service. We had had a little time at breakfast together that morning. And he said, I was interested in what you preached on tonight, that's good truth, good sermon, Jim. I said, thank you, Brother Dave. He said, but can I tell you something about pastoring that I've learned, and about being used by God? I said, tell me. He said, Tim, what do you feel about this? Isn't it true, God never really uses anyone, and you never grow and really bear a lot of fruit, unless you get crazy for Jesus? He said, did you ever see anyone who God used, who was conservative, and just played it close to the vest? And just, I'll do a little, but no, no. He said, who, it's like crazy. Crazy for God. And so in love with him, that we're ready to just go, he'll give us wisdom, he'll give us balance, but we're not gonna hold back, we're gonna love passionately. Some of you here are waiting for God to give you or God to do something in your life, and while you're doing it, who are you serving? Who are you serving? I'm asking, who are you serving? Don't tell me about your family. People don't know God served their family. That's good to serve your family. But who in the body of Christ might need you? What ministry could you be involved in? And if you just sit here and say, I wanna be a spectator, that's an easy way to not be an overcomer, to be pulled back, to be distracted. So I wanna say to everybody here today, because I love you and you have talents and abilities I don't have, ask God tonight, say, God, I wanna be an overcomer, but the people who overcome are the doers. I will give every man according to what he does, every woman according to what she does. Faith without works is muerte, dead. It's dead. So that's for all of us. And you know, I've had examples of both kinds. I've seen ministers that I admire, right to the end, and they're writing, they're praying, and even when they're held up and they can't get around like they used to, they have praying chairs. I knew a man who had a praying chair and he had long lists of dozens and dozens of things he would pray and weep over. He couldn't preach anymore, but he would just spend his hours praying for things. That's what I wanna be. I wanna be a soldier crazy to the end. Crazy to the end. Come on, how many are with me? Say amen. Otherwise, we kind of backslide and the devil starts to overcome us and we go like, look, I did that, I put in my time. Like a company, I put in my time. You never put in your enough time for Jesus. That's the way we're overcomers. Moving ahead. Nothing's stopping us. No Jezebel gonna trick us. Not tolerating any junk. Not gonna tolerate it. Let's close our eyes. I think these are sobering words. What do you think, congregation? If they weren't in the Bible, I wouldn't read them. They're in the Bible. I have to cover them. They're one of the letters. And all scriptures inspired by God is profitable. Will help us if we receive it with childlike spirit. If someone's bristling here and saying, no, I don't wanna hear that. Look, I leave you with God. I leave you with God. Nobody's blood is on my hands tonight. I've spoken the best I know how from the word of God. To him, to her who overcomes, I'm gonna give a crown and give the morning star. They will reign with me. They will rule over the nations with me. And for all eternity, they will have perfect joy and perfect peace. To everyone who overcomes, who trusts me, who endures, who keeps loving. In the last days, Jesus said, perilous times would come. The love of most would wax cold. Things would get so evil that people would recoil and not love anymore and show the world Christ's compassion. There may be some people here, you're struggling. Listen, we all have a battle to overcome. That's a given. No one's looking down on anyone here. But if you're really in the midst of a battle where the enemy's trying to just knock you out, knock you out, knock out everything sacred, get to your children through you, you gotta come and stand. You gotta come up here and stand. Let us just quietly lay our hands on you. God's gonna give you grace tonight. You're gonna be an overcomer. You're gonna be an overcomer. For we are more than conquerors as we trust Christ. Now, Christ knows everything, so I don't have to read anybody's mind. I don't have to read anybody's mind or heart here. You just come up here to the front and say, Pastor, I could use somebody praying for me. Just stand right here in the front. Thank you, Jesus, for your word to us tonight. Through Christ, we are overcomers. Doesn't matter what the enemy throws against us. Don't matter how many difficulties we face. With God, nothing is impossible. And I thank you, Lord, that you're stronger than our weakness. In fact, your strength is made perfect in our weakness. Your grace shines brightest when we just fall at your feet and say, God, I can't do this. That's when you hold us. We soar with you above the storm. Help us to endure some little trial because life is full of them. Help us to open our mouths and share Christ, invite someone, love someone, talk to someone, pray for someone. Just give us an open door, Lord, so we can say something for you. Bless your people. Let your face shine upon them tonight. And give us peace. The shalom of God. Does any anxious heart here still, Lord, right now, just bring peace? So that when we walk out of here, we're under the control of your peace, your spirit. We ask all these things in the name of Jesus Christ. And everyone said.