Defective Consecration - Part 2

You say, what do you mean you're obedience up to date? You're going to have to make sure that you've done everything God told you to do. Now, there's no hope of walking with God if your obedience is not up to date. And you know, an average Baptist church, do you know what the steps of obedience are in average Baptist church? Come to church, come to church, tithe, read your Bible, pray, not much of that, go witnessing, don't smoke, don't curse, don't wear shorts, don't let your hair get too long.

The average Baptist, my dear friends, can do about 10 things and be a super saint. And all 10 of them can be done in the flesh without doing any of them. And you do not have God or do you need God? Certainly you do not have Him till you have to have Him.

Man's got to keep his obedience up to date. God's never told you to do something and you haven't done it. There's no possible way that you can walk in the light.

He's in the light. So you get that obedience up to date. The average Baptist takes about two steps of grace.

He gets victory over stealing, gets, usually most of them get maybe another victory or two. Let me tell you something. Every time you meet God and get victory, you have a moral change.

Now, how many times have you been morally, morally changed? I had a significant leader among Baptists to send me word that his wife had been to a conference and she got freed. I knew her real well, so I was interested in what she got freed from. So she had too much class to say she got freed from demons.

I said, well, then why don't you get freed too? She said, I just got free. I said, on what basis of revelation from the word of God did you base your faith and what has been your moral character since that day? Was there a moral change? And she said, I don't know what you're talking about, preacher. And I said, bless God, you hadn't met God.

Some people get a little sensation in the flesh and enlargement in the intellect in a church meeting and they call it God. You meet God, David, you are changed moral. That's called growing in grace.

That's called being obedient to the light. And the basis of that moral change is the living word of God. And the method of that moral change is simply by faith.

So a person, if they're going to have manifested in their life, the life of Christ Jesus, have victory over sin, have sweetness of Jesus coming out, not fulfilling the lust of the flesh. They're going to have to keep their obedience up to date. Obedience up to date.

Is it up to date tonight? You've done everything God told you to do. You said, Brother Manley, I'm afraid I haven't. Well, you know what revival is? The revival is beginning when you get your obedience up to date.

Get it up to date. Now, the next, I believe the next step, if there is a, if you want to put it in steps fashion, as to maintaining this walk, yieldedness to Jesus, where the sweetness of Jesus comes out of your life. And I'm taking all of this right out of 1 John, and I didn't read this portion.

The first chapter, verse 5 through the rest of the chapter, is that we have to have our sins confessed up to date. Now, my dear friends, when man sinned in Adam and Eve, and man fell, man was so totally affected that even through the remedy of the cross and the blood and the power of the Holy Spirit, man was not so delivered and is not so delivered from sin that man does never have to confess sin once they are saved and sanctified by the Spirit of the living God. Man never gets so spiritually mature that he doesn't have to keep his sins confessed up to date.

And if we are going to maintain that life that God wants us to have, our consecration not being defected, we are going to have to, my dear friends, keep our sins confessed up to date. The amazing thing about it is a lot of us tonight do not have any deliberate willful known sins, maybe, but there are a lot of sins that are there in our lives and we're not even aware of them that need to be confessed and forsaken. This is the strategy of the devil in the light of what I've said.

He loves this rededication stuff. He loves this work religion. What do we Baptists call it? Trying our best.

He loves that stuff. He loves you trying your best. You say, what do you mean trying your best? Well, if I own the 40 acre piece of land tonight and I sold Brother Jimmy 39 acres of that land and he went out there and he built him a 39 acre house on that 39 acres and left my one acre as his patio, I could come back years later and say, Brother Jimmy, I'd like a little dirt off of my one acre.

And he'd say, well, you can't have it. I made a patio out of it. I could go down to the proper enforcement officers and show them my agreement for that one acre.

That's my one acre. And he couldn't stop me. He'd have to tear some of his house down to give me a ride away to that one acre.

And my dear friends, listen tonight. The devil does not. He has pulled a strategy over Baptists.

And my dear friends, the strategy is what I call a work strategy, a rededication strategy. You're trying your best. You're doing your best you can.

You give 39 acres of your life to God. You sing in the choir. You tithe.

You witness. You read your Bible. You pray.

You go to church. What else do you do? But my dear friends, let me tell you something. There's something in your life you know about.

There's something in your life like an uncontrollable temper or something like that you know about. And there it is. And you know it's there.

Maybe something else. Maybe the fact that you steal or something like that. But you've got a definite known sin in that life.

There's an acre in your life. Your all is not yielded to Jesus. It's not 40 acres yielded to the Lord.

It's 39. And the devil has got an acre. And Jesus is either Lord of all or he's not Lord at all.

And what happens, my dear friends, if he's got one acre in you, he's got all 39. That's what I've said. If he's got one, he's got it all.

Because all you've done is worked in the flesh. The devil doesn't care how many things you do as long as you do not make Jesus Lord of all. Lord of all.

Lord of every bit of it. That's right. Now, you may be just a babe in Christ.

But my dear friends, you can name him Jesus, Lord of all, tonight. You may have been saved a long time. You may have a lot of knowledge.

Maybe not a lot of life. But I want you to know he can be Lord of all tonight. And if he's not Lord of all, he's not Lord at all.

And as long as he's got one acre in your life, he can control you. Because if he's got one acre, the spirit of life in Christ Jesus is not working. That's why, my dear friends, somebody can punch a button and you get mad and wish you hadn't done it.

If you're walking in the spirit, my dear friend, right with God, he has to get permission. Amen. You say, but brother, man, the flesh is weak and we're just old sinners saved by grace.

But brother, if you're saved and right with God, filled with the spirit, you have victory over that flesh. So that's one acre there tonight. One acre.

It's not right on the line for God. Every bit of it. He's in charge of the whole, the flesh and the devil's in charge of the whole bit.

You know, no wonder I was so upset. Jesus is either Lord of all or he's not Lord at all. Amen.

He's Lord of all of it or he's not Lord at all. Would you bow your heads with me to pray? Brother Jimmy. Amen.

Thank God for the message tonight, Brother Fred. We listen to some song as we just worship God, ask ourselves the question, are we up to date in our obedience? Anything in our life we need to settle with God tonight and just simply let go and let God have his way in our heart. Brother Fred, why don't we just worship the Lord in song as we all just search our hearts and let Jesus have his way.

I surrender all to him I freely give. I will ever love and trust him in his presence daily live. I surrender all, I surrender all, all to thee, my blessed savior, I surrender.

I choose to come this time and worship the Lord with our evening offering. Brother Smith, would some of you men just come?