Participants:
Series Code: GYC
Program Code: GYC190002S
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00:34 If you but trust in God to guide you
00:41 And place your confidence in Him 00:47 You'll find Him always there beside you 00:53 To give you hope and strength within 00:59 For those who trust God's changeless love 01:05 Build on the Rock that will not move 01:16 What gain is there in futile weeping 01:22 In helpless anger and distress 01:27 If you are in His care and keeping 01:32 In sorrow will He love you less 01:38 For He who took for you a cross 01:43 Will bring you safe through every loss 01:53 Sing, pray, and keep His ways unswerving 01:59 Offer your service faithfully 02:04 And trust His word though undeserving 02:09 You'll find His promise true to be 02:14 God never will forsake in need 02:20 The soul that trusts in Him indeed 02:30 God never will forsake in need 02:35 The soul that trusts in Him indeed 03:02 Good evening, everyone. 03:06 Welcome to GYC. 03:09 Welcome to the year 2020. 03:14 How many of you are excited to be here this evening? 03:17 Amen. 03:21 Friends, 03:24 the first thing that I would like to do 03:25 as we begin this conference 03:27 is just give a rousing amen 03:29 to those that have made it happen. 03:31 Can you do that with me? 03:33 Amen. 03:34 So many people, most of them here, 03:37 but some that cannot be here 03:39 have put so much time and effort 03:42 into allowing this conference to be a possibility. 03:45 And we believe that 03:46 God is going to do something mighty 03:48 over the next few days. 03:51 My name is Dean Cullinane. 03:53 I was born in the Republic of Ireland, 03:55 grew up in London, England. 03:58 My wife in here who was just on the stage. 04:01 We've lived in the United States 04:03 for exactly four years now as of last night. 04:07 The Lord blessed us with the opportunity 04:11 and possibility to move to California, 04:13 where I've been studying at Weimar College, 04:16 one of our Adventist institutions there. 04:19 And I now work as the dean at Weimar Academy. 04:24 I've heard all the jokes of dean the dean, 04:27 but I have the privilege of being there 04:29 and working with some amazing young people 04:31 from the ages of 14 to 18. 04:33 And I'm excited as well to just praise the Lord 04:36 because as of two weeks ago, I finished with school. 04:40 I'm very grateful that the Lord has led me through that. 04:44 And if I had to ask you to have a wild guess 04:47 as so what it is or what it was that I was studying, 04:51 I imagine that you would fall into one of three categories. 04:56 Surely, I must either be studying theology, 04:59 I must be studying Education 05:01 or I must be studying something in the medical field, 05:03 maybe nursing or premed. 05:06 And the reason if you did pick one of those three, 05:10 I think, is because as Adventists, 05:14 it's almost as if that's just what we're meant to do. 05:17 Have you realized? 05:19 It's almost as if 05:20 those are the only three options available. 05:22 I mean, if you went to a public secular university, 05:26 you would have no chance at guessing what that person 05:30 that you just walked up to is studying. 05:32 There's no way you'd get it, zoology, meteorology, 05:35 engineering, psychology, it's endless. 05:38 But if you go to an Adventist, 05:42 you can look like a prophet 05:44 if you just take a wild guess at one of those three. 05:48 And if you did take a wild guess 05:49 at one of those three, you will be right. 05:51 I've just finished studying theology. 05:53 But I think the reason why we fall 05:56 into one of those categories 05:58 is because we believe that especially there 06:01 can we make a difference. 06:05 I believe within all of us gathered here this evening 06:08 that there is a desire to truly make a difference. 06:11 So let's choose one of those categories, 06:13 not my own. 06:15 Let's choose being a doctor. 06:16 How much difference 06:18 can one doctor make in the world? 06:21 A group of researchers teamed up 06:23 with an aspiring doctor 06:24 that had the same desires to figure this out. 06:27 And they concluded that the average doctor 06:29 adds to his patients a combined 140 years of life. 06:34 And that's not an easy thing to put a number on, 06:36 but that's the number they came to 06:38 with a few degrees of variants. 06:40 Now using a standard conversion rate 06:42 given by the World Bank, 06:43 they've concluded that 30 extra years of life 06:46 is considered a life saved. 06:49 So on average, a doctor, 06:51 speaking about doctors in developing countries, 06:54 save about five lives 06:56 over the course of their career. 06:58 Now without wanting to devalue life 07:00 or under appreciate the work of physicians, 07:03 five lives doesn't seem like an awful lot. 07:08 Some doctors, though, do achieve an awful lot. 07:11 Take Dr. David Nalin, for example. 07:14 Working in Burma and Bangladesh, 07:16 he discovered a breakthrough treatment 07:18 for patients suffering from diarrhea. 07:21 He figured out that giving patients water 07:23 mixed with the specific 07:25 and just right concentration of sugar and water, 07:28 they would rehydrate 07:29 at the same rate in which they are losing fluids. 07:32 Since then, which was in 1968, 07:35 the annual rate of deaths from diarrhea has dropped 07:38 from 5 million a year to 1.3 million. 07:42 So when you compare the numbers, 07:44 he's saving hundreds of thousands 07:46 of more people every year 07:48 than the average doctor is today. 07:51 Those numbers though dwindle when you compare them 07:54 to that have called Landsteiner, 07:56 who discovered blood groups and changed the way 07:59 that we even view anatomy and physiology. 08:02 Oh, consider one, Stanislav Petrov, 08:06 a lieutenant colonel in the Soviet Army 08:08 during the Cold War. 08:09 In 1983, Petro was on duty as a Soviet missile base 08:14 when early warning systems indicated to him 08:17 that the United States had sent incoming missiles. 08:22 Protocol therefore dictated that the Soviet Army 08:25 returned the strike, 08:27 but Petrov did not push the button. 08:29 He reasoned that the number of missiles 08:31 was far too few to warn a counterattack 08:34 and thereby disobeyed protocol. 08:37 If he had ordered a strike, 08:39 there is at least a reasonable chance 08:41 that hundreds of millions would have died. 08:44 The two countries would likely 08:46 have entered into all-out nuclear war 08:49 leading to billions of deaths possibly. 08:52 If we're being conservative, we might say 08:54 that Petrov saved 1 billion lives, 08:57 but even that could be an underestimation. 09:01 Why am I telling you this? 09:03 Because I feel as though wanting to make a difference 09:06 is not enough. 09:10 Instead of trying to make a difference, 09:12 I believe that we should be trying to make the difference. 09:16 You see, I don't want to just change things, 09:19 I want to completely transform and revolutionize them. 09:24 I remember shortly after I became an Adventist, 09:27 I was called to this event. 09:29 It was titled Each One Reach One. 09:32 Great premise. 09:33 If everyone reached one person, 09:34 the world church would double in a year. 09:37 And when you look at that kind of exponential growth, 09:39 we'd probably be going home very soon. 09:41 The problem is when everyone is set such a low target, 09:44 there's not a whole lot of motivation to meet it. 09:47 If I'm set that target in January 1, 09:49 I can wait until December to try and reach my 1. 09:52 And then December rolls on and I don't have enough time. 09:55 And so I had an idea. 09:57 What if we changed it just slightly? 09:59 What if instead of each one reach one, 10:02 it became each one reach one thousand. 10:07 We'd better start on January 2. 10:12 Friends, I'm not comfortable 10:14 with just bringing one person to Jesus. 10:18 Is bringing one person good? Absolutely. 10:21 Does heaven rejoice 10:23 when one person comes to the Lord? 10:24 Yes. Yes, they do. 10:25 Would Jesus have come for just one person? 10:27 Yes, He would have. 10:29 But what I want to speak to you about this evening 10:31 is about making the difference, 10:33 maximizing our reach 10:35 and making the most amount of difference. 10:38 Being the ones that are responsible 10:41 for changing the entire world 10:43 because when I read the Bible, that is what I see. 10:46 I see wholesale change. 10:48 I see people that would not settle 10:51 for anything less than complete transformation. 10:53 And when I look at the story of Jonathan 10:55 and his armor-bearer in 1 Samuel Chapter 14, 10:58 that is what I see. 11:02 Friends, the title for this evening's message 11:05 is A Thousand Shall Run. 11:08 Let's pray. 11:10 Father in heaven, this is Your time, 11:12 this is Your stage, 11:14 this is Your Word. 11:16 We ask that You would speak to our hearts 11:19 and change us even now. 11:21 In the name of Jesus we pray, Amen. 11:25 I often hawk on about reading the Bible 11:28 for the first time again. 11:31 I know it doesn't make much sense at first. 11:33 Listen, but could you imagine going over the stories 11:36 that you know so well for the first time 11:38 and receiving them as fresh as they were 11:41 that very first time you went through. 11:44 I actually started a ministry of podcast 11:46 on this very idea. 11:47 It's called Why They Did That? 11:49 We have a booth over there, big yellow booth 11:51 that we'd love for you to come and check out 11:52 about helping you to read the Bible again 11:55 for the very first time. 11:57 You see, we know the stories, 11:59 but we often don't know why they're there. 12:02 The Bible, friends, is more than a book. 12:04 It's more than a storybook, and it's more than a collection 12:07 of storybooks. 12:08 The Bible is a manual, a manual on how to live. 12:13 And the stories here in the Old Testament 12:15 are recorded not so that we would know 12:16 the right order of history 12:18 but so that we would be able to enter in 12:22 to the scriptures so that we will be transported back 12:25 millennia and look through the characters 12:28 that we love so dearly and look through them so deeply 12:31 that we would see ourselves in them. 12:35 If you were to go through the story 12:37 of 1 Samuel Chapter 13 and 14, 12:40 you would get there having a decent understanding 12:42 of what is taking place in Israel. 12:44 There's two main players. 12:46 There's Samuel and there is Saul. 12:48 One is the prophet, the other one is the king. 12:51 One is faithful, the other one is Saul. 12:58 And if you continue to read through, 13:00 if you'll turn with me please the 1 Samuel Chapter 13, 13:04 we're introduced to the character 13:07 in whom GYC's key theme has come from. 13:12 It says in verse 1 of 1 Samuel 13, 13:14 "Saul reigned one year, 13:16 and when he had reigned two years over Israel, 13:18 Saul chose for himself three thousand men of Israel. 13:20 Whereof 2,000 were with Saul and 1,000 were with Jonathan. 13:24 And the rest of the people, he sent every man to his tent." 13:27 Verse three, and "Jonathan smote 13:29 the garrison of the Philistines that was in Geba, 13:32 and the Philistines heard of it. 13:33 And Saul blew the trumpet throughout the land, saying, 13:36 'Let the Hebrews hear.'" 13:38 So let me ask you a question, 13:40 if you're reading this for the first time, 13:42 who is Jonathan? 13:44 Some of you would say, well, he is Saul's son. 13:45 But here's the thing, if you are reading it 13:47 for the first time, you don't know that yet. 13:49 You don't know that Jonathan is Saul's son 13:52 because he has not been introduced as Saul's son. 13:54 When we first hear Jonathan, 13:56 Jonathan is introduced as a warrior. 13:59 Introduction to him is one that he is slaying Philistines, 14:03 where his victory is so great that all the Philistines here 14:06 have it to the point that they're in retreat. 14:09 Sister White says that Saul's army 14:11 were filled with hope and courage 14:13 upon Jonathan's victory. 14:15 And that if it was followed through a great result 14:18 could have taken place for the liberties of Israel. 14:23 It isn't until verse 16, you see, 14:26 because my question was, 14:28 well, why wasn't Jonathan chosen as the King? 14:30 It isn't until you get to verse 16, 14:32 halfway through the story that the Bible says and Saul, 14:35 and Jonathan, his son, it throws in that minor detail, 14:40 that seemingly minor detail halfway through the narrative, 14:43 which isn't really how characters are introduced 14:46 in the scriptures. 14:47 And so I looked at this and I asked myself, "Why? 14:50 Why introduced him first as a warrior 14:53 and then later on as the son of Saul?" 14:56 Perhaps, you could look it as a coincidence. 15:00 But I don't believe in coincidences 15:02 when it comes to the scriptures. 15:04 I believe that holy men were moved by the Holy Ghost 15:08 and wrote these things so that we could study them 15:10 and learn them. 15:12 Perhaps the Spirit of God wants us to recognize 15:15 that it is not who you are that matters, 15:18 it is what you are. 15:21 Jonathan's dad was a mess, a complete mess. 15:24 Yet despite who his father was and his family issues, 15:28 God was about to use him based on who he was in Christ, 15:33 who his father was didn't matter, 15:35 what mattered was who his Heavenly Father was. 15:39 At the age of 10 years old, 15:41 I found out that my father was a rapist, 15:45 that my existence was the result of a man 15:47 that could not control his lusts. 15:50 A man whose friend trusted him to take his fiance home 15:53 after a late hour house party, 15:56 a man who drove to the nearest field, 15:59 took out a bottle of vodka 16:00 and smashed it over my mother's head 16:02 and rendering her unconscious 16:04 and proceeding to rape her multiple times. 16:08 I carried that with me for nine years. 16:11 For nine years, I believe that everything 16:12 that happened in my life was a result 16:15 of that horrible action. 16:17 Those were dark times, 16:18 times when I didn't know the Lord, but the Lord knew me. 16:22 And when the time was right, he revealed Himself to me. 16:25 When life was darkest, 16:27 the light shone through the brightest. 16:30 When I was closest in my life to throwing in the towel, 16:33 that's when God whose hand is not too short 16:35 to save showed up. 16:37 He gave me purpose. 16:39 He gave me a reason to exist. 16:41 He put love in my heart where there was once hatred. 16:45 And he showed me that, Dean, 16:46 it doesn't matter who your father is, 16:47 I am your father. 16:50 Friends, it matters not 16:52 whose blood runs through your veins, 16:54 it matters that the blood of the Son of God 16:57 was spilled for you. 16:59 I want to tell you here this evening 17:02 that our identity is not found in family trees 17:05 and DNA markers. 17:07 It is not so much about 23 and me 17:10 as much as it is about 33 and me, 17:13 33 years of the life of Christ 17:15 will have far more effect on the person 17:18 that you are going to be than two sets of chromosomes. 17:22 Our identity as Christians, our identity as Adventists, 17:26 our identity as humans is found wrapped up in God, 17:30 in the person of Jesus Christ. 17:34 So we get to 1 Samuel Chapter 14 17:37 and Saul is soaking under a pomegranate tree. 17:42 And you have to be really, really soaking 17:44 to soak under a pomegranate tree. 17:47 He's given up, but Jonathan has not. 17:52 Jonathan takes his armor-bearer 17:54 and they had on a kamikaze mission. 17:56 If ever you have seen one, 17:58 it's where he utters those words in verse six. 18:01 "Come and let us cross over to the garrison 18:02 of these uncircumcised. 18:04 It may be that the Lord will work for us: 18:06 for there is no restraint to the Lord 18:08 to save by many or by few or by many." 18:11 Don't just repass that. 18:12 That's crazy. 18:13 That's crazy talk. 18:15 That's like me and Brother Jem going to Afghanistan. 18:19 And standing outside the borders of Afghanistan, 18:21 and where they're on Instagram Live, 18:23 so you can all watch. 18:24 And I'm like, "Hey, we're just gonna run in 18:25 and try and convert as many people in this country 18:28 where it's literally illegal to be Christian." 18:30 We're just gonna go in, maybe go to work, 18:32 maybe you won't. 18:36 It's crazy. 18:38 Crazy faith. 18:41 It's insane, but that's exactly what they go and do. 18:44 He says it may be that God will work for us. 18:48 Friends, this is not presumption, 18:49 this is faith. 18:51 Faith, as our pioneer AT Jones once said 18:54 is taking the Word of God 18:56 as it is and trusting and depending only in that word 18:59 to get it done. 19:01 So Jonathan and his armor-bearer, 19:02 they go forward. 19:04 They go forward bearing those promises in mind. 19:07 And they test the Lord. 19:08 Lord, if this is Your will, then when we show up, 19:10 tell them to come. 19:12 And so they show up there and they see, they look older, 19:15 the Hebrews have come out of their caves, come up to us. 19:18 Let us show you something. 19:19 And so Jonathan looks at his armor-bearer and says, 19:21 "The Lord is with us. 19:23 Let's go." 19:25 They go. 19:27 And, friends, they slay them all. 19:31 How much of a difference did they make? 19:34 Look at the very last verse 23. 19:36 Sorry, 1 Samuel 14: 23 says, 19:39 "So the Lord saved Israel that day." 19:42 That's how much a difference they made. 19:44 This is the same language that was used 19:46 when God delivered them from the Egyptians 19:48 through the Red Sea. 19:49 The Lord saved them that day. 19:53 It seems crazy that this is how God is working. 19:57 But, friends, let me let you in on little secret. 20:00 Can I do that? 20:02 Christianity is crazy. 20:07 Christianity is bonkers. 20:10 The problem is that we have spent far too much time 20:13 trying to make Christianity normal. 20:17 It was never meant to be normal. 20:19 Raining food down from heaven isn't normal, 20:23 parting seas and sending plagues, 20:26 God becoming a man and then dying, resurrections, 20:29 blind people seeing, deaf people hearing, 20:31 dumb people speaking, 20:33 martyrs singing at the stake, for instance, is not normal, 20:37 it was never meant to be normal. 20:40 And it is in the time that we have put forth 20:42 the most effort to make this normal 20:44 that we've been least effective. 20:46 It's in our efforts to not feel ostracized by the world 20:50 that we've somehow lost sight of our mission. 20:53 It's in our efforts to blend back in with the world 20:55 that we look strange to heaven. 20:57 It's in our efforts to be normal 20:59 that we have appeared uniquely strange. 21:03 Christianity and Adventism was always meant to be crazy. 21:08 Moses summed this up when right before his death 21:11 at the end of the book of Deuteronomy, 21:13 he looked at his people, and he says, 21:14 "One man of you shall chase a thousand." 21:18 Can you picture that in your head? 21:20 A thousand men running away from just one. 21:24 Joshua II on his deathbed, In Joshua 23:10, says, 21:28 "One man of you shall chase a thousand," how, 21:31 "for the Lord your God is with you 21:33 He is it that fighteth for you, as He promised you." 21:38 Friends, one man can make a thousand run. 21:41 That's crazy. But that's Christianity. 21:43 To have faith to stand before a thousand men 21:46 because you know that God stands behind you, 21:48 that's faith. 21:50 He wins the victory on our behalf. 21:52 I know I would not be here today 21:53 if I had to fight my own battles. 21:57 Sister White says that Jonathan was moved by a divine impulse, 22:02 a divine impulse. 22:04 I used to think that God had stopped sending 22:07 divine impulses. 22:08 And then I realized that he has been sending 22:11 more and more divine impulses as time has gone on. 22:14 The difference is that 22:15 we just seem to not have the faith 22:17 to go forward with those divine impulses. 22:22 And so I was looking through Ellen White's writings 22:24 looking for a time 22:25 when she brought up this phrase, 22:26 she uses it, of course, in this story, 22:28 but she also uses it in the story of Balaam 22:31 as he's prophesied of the coming of the Messiah, 22:34 and then speaks of it in the Great Controversy 22:36 as God's lost people being moved 22:39 by divine impulse to go forth 22:41 with holy zeal and shine for His glory. 22:44 And then there was another quote. 22:48 And the quote was simply this, 22:50 "As long as the cross of Christ is kept in view, 22:55 there will be a divine impulse to render to God, 22:59 body, soul, and spirit." 23:02 Friends, as long as the cross is kept in view, 23:05 there will be a divine impulse. 23:07 Can you say amen? 23:09 Now, of course, of course, if you wanted to believe 23:13 that one person could make all the difference, 23:16 you need only to look at the one person 23:18 that did make all the difference. 23:22 Friends, let me tell you, 23:24 Adventism is nothing without the cross. 23:28 Do we have the sanctuary? Yes. 23:29 The three angels' message? Yes. 23:31 Prophecy, health, lifestyle, we have all of these things, 23:34 but what will tie the ministries 23:36 and the churches 23:37 that go forward with Adventism and leave Christ behind? 23:43 More about Jesus, more about the cross, 23:47 Adventism has not exhausted the cross. 23:52 Sometimes we dangerously tread the path of putting prophecy 23:56 before the prophet himself. 23:58 We have far too many evangelistic series 24:00 where we are telling off times and dates but not of Christ. 24:03 We have limited the power of the gospel 24:05 to Biblical arithmetic. 24:07 And all that does is it produces Christians 24:09 that are convinced but are not converted. 24:14 Jonathan had the cross of Christ kept in view. 24:18 And he may not have seen that yet. 24:20 But he had the picture of the character of God 24:23 as He went forward. 24:24 And, friends, if you and I 24:25 were to keep the cross before us, 24:27 if we were to sleep there, and to awake there, 24:30 and to walk there and talk there, 24:31 if we were to live there, 24:33 we would be doing truly radical things for Jesus. 24:37 If we saw what one man accomplished 24:39 with his whole life wrapped up in the Father's will, 24:42 we would go forth with that same confidence. 24:44 And so I encourage you in all that you do, 24:47 preach the cross, think on the cross, 24:49 lift up the cross, 24:51 and go forward knowing that the man 24:53 that hung on the cross hung there for you 24:56 so that you could change the world. 25:00 But I think this narrative has a little more to say. 25:04 Notice that as Jonathan goes forth, 25:07 as I mentioned, Saul sits there, 25:09 sulking under the pomegranate tree. 25:13 Friends, it would have been easy for Jonathan 25:15 to sit there also, 25:17 if he were alive today, 25:18 and we're a millennial like myself 25:20 and some of you, oh, it would have been so easy. 25:23 He would have just sat there 25:25 and reverted to type as the Israelites 25:27 and just moaned and moaned and moaned. 25:32 Now, friends, it's one thing to be frustrated. 25:35 It's another thing to not agree 25:37 with every decision that is made. 25:41 But we go too far when we sit down in a huff 25:44 and moan about how things are not happening in our church 25:47 and how leadership is failing 25:49 and how the church has lost its focus. 25:52 There's a name for people like that today, trolls, 25:57 Facebook warriors who are theologians 25:59 in their basements 26:00 but are not leaving to witness to Jesus about anyone else. 26:05 Our excuses have not changed. 26:07 "Oh, I can't. 26:09 I'm not enabled. I'm not equipped. 26:10 My Church is too old. 26:11 It's too restrictive, you wouldn't understand." 26:14 Listen, 26:16 while the church leadership 26:17 was sitting under a pomegranate tree, 26:19 having a big moan that the work was far too hard to get done, 26:23 Jonathan was out there getting things done. 26:29 You have two options, friends, you are part of the problem 26:31 or part of the solution. 26:33 And I encourage you, 26:34 if you think you might be part of the problem 26:36 or you're surrounded by people that are part of the problem, 26:39 take that same energy that we so often put 26:42 into critiquing and redirected into productivity 26:47 because whilst inside you're claiming that 26:50 it can't be done, 26:51 God has people out there getting it done. 26:54 When it's too many people complain about their elders 26:57 and their pastors 26:58 and their conference presidents, 27:01 in the words of our world church president, 27:03 go forward. 27:05 You need no permission to work for God. 27:07 You need no degree. 27:09 You need no special blessing 27:11 other than the one that God Himself 27:13 is waiting to outpour. 27:15 Jonathan did not wait. 27:17 Verse one tells us that he did not even tell his father 27:20 what he was going to do. 27:22 He just got up and did something 27:25 about the problem. 27:26 Friends, we do not wait for man to come on, 27:29 because God has already commissioned us. 27:34 What makes me wonder 27:35 is that maybe we just don't actually want it enough. 27:39 Maybe we've just been here for so long 27:41 and we've read enough that we have a good understanding 27:44 of what things could be like, 27:45 we just much rather someone else made it so, 27:49 we'd much rather sometimes as young people 27:51 sit at the back of the church 27:53 scrolling down on Instagram, 27:55 moaning that the pastor has no idea what he's doing. 27:59 We'd much rather moan 28:00 that our friend was disfellowshipped, 28:02 but not show up at the business meeting. 28:04 We'd much rather criticize a movement that God raised up 28:08 and not man but neglect to get ourselves involved 28:11 so we can understand 28:12 why certain decisions were made. 28:16 Friends, I believe that this church 28:18 will do exactly what God said it will do, 28:20 it will go right to the end, 28:21 until the coming of Jesus Christ. 28:23 But the more that I'm here, 28:24 the more I'm resigned to the fact, 28:26 it is going to be a painful journey. 28:29 Friends, Jonathan gave up his life here. 28:32 He gave it up in this chapter. 28:33 He didn't die, but he was willing to. 28:35 And that makes me kind of afraid 28:37 because I don't see that zeal very often anymore. 28:41 I'm fearful that our young people 28:43 would rather show off their new shoes 28:44 than their old Bibles. 28:46 I'm fearful that our young people say 28:48 that they cannot hear God 28:50 speak to them through the Bible, 28:51 but yet we binge watch Marvel movies as though 28:53 they're the only way to heaven. 28:56 I'm fearful that Jesus stood before a whole heap of men 29:00 that were wanting to take his life 29:01 and he said, "I am the bread of life. 29:03 I am the way, I am the truth, I am the life." 29:06 And when we read those things, 29:07 there's no semblance of emotion. 29:09 But when a fictional character appears on the big screen, 29:12 snaps his fingers and says, "I am Iron Man," 29:14 everyone is in tears, even our own young people. 29:19 We wonder why miracles don't happen today 29:22 when we've made our God's digital ones. 29:26 We wonder why we can't see God anymore 29:28 when our feet are in the church but our head is outside. 29:33 Friends, I want to encourage you this evening. 29:36 I believe with all my heart that God can use you 29:39 to change the world, 29:40 but to do so, he needs all of you. 29:44 To do so, he needs every single part of you. 29:48 We cannot be used by the Holy Spirit 29:50 if our lives are singing I Surrender Most. 29:54 I encourage you all. 29:55 Take responsibility for the condition 29:58 of your local churches, 30:00 and then take responsibility for being the change 30:03 that you believe is necessary. 30:05 Be the difference, strive for that 30:09 because when God asks you what you did with your time 30:12 and the talents that he gave you, 30:13 you can't sit there and say, "Well, I tried a couple times." 30:20 Friends, I encourage you to put your trust in the Lord. 30:22 One man shall make a thousand run. How? 30:25 The Lord, your God, it is He that fights for you. 30:29 He has promised you, 30:30 take those promises and claim those promises. 30:34 Put your name there, Dean shall make a thousand run, 30:38 the Lord your God, He shall fight for Dean. 30:41 He has promised Dean. 30:44 And the very next verse in Joshua 23:11, says, 30:47 "Take heed therefore that you love God." 30:52 Friends, check that, analyze that. 30:55 You cannot love God by default. 30:58 God will fight for you, so he says, "Love Me." 31:01 And do the scriptures define how we should love Him 31:04 with all of our hearts, 31:05 friends, with all of your hearts. 31:09 Movies and television, celebrities and pop culture, 31:13 social media and attention craving. 31:16 You cannot give those things your heart and also love God, 31:19 not the way He asked. 31:21 "No other gods" is what He said. 31:23 That was the command. 31:25 Friends, you can make 31:26 all the difference in the world. 31:28 You can be like Jonathan here in I Samuel 14, 31:31 and you'll never know how much of a difference you make 31:33 until you put those things to the side 31:36 and give your whole entire life to Jesus. 31:40 Dr. Thomas Barnardo didn't know how much of an impact 31:43 he was going to make until 60,000 children 31:46 were taken into one of the 96 homes 31:49 that he was responsible for erecting. 31:52 How about the man who coined the phrase, 31:54 "The Bible will keep you from sin 31:56 or sin will keep you from the Bible"? 31:58 Dwight Moody has no idea 32:00 how many people he's responsible for saving, 32:02 but he will see in the kingdom of God, 32:04 just the power, 32:05 just what the power of the gospel can do. 32:08 Tell the orphans of Bristol that George MA 1/4ller 32:11 was only one man 32:12 and couldn't make much of a difference. 32:15 Tell John Boss that thousands of disabled people 32:18 that he helped with asylum just weren't worth the efforts. 32:21 Tell Ellen White next time you see her 32:23 that the years that she spent laboring away 32:26 writing book after book after book 32:28 so that you and I would have a more complete picture 32:31 of the character of God 32:32 that she just didn't make enough of a difference. 32:35 Tell the Son of God, the King of kings, 32:38 who became a babe and lived a sinless life, 32:41 surrounded himself with 12 men 32:43 that you and I would likely shun today 32:45 invite to the devil to be his friend in the hope 32:48 of changing his heart. 32:49 A Man that suffered like no man, 32:51 a Man who was deserted by his closest friends, 32:54 a Man that went to the cross and suffered untold agony 32:57 so that you and I could have a chance to be saved 32:59 from this horrid world. 33:01 You tell Him that one person cannot make a difference. 33:06 Friends, God will fight for you. 33:09 As an individual, not just as a world church, 33:12 God will fight for you. 33:16 Do you believe that one person 33:20 can change the course of human history? 33:23 I invite you as we close 33:24 to turn to the book of Ecclesiastes. 33:27 There's a story hidden deep inside this book, 33:31 Ecclesiastes Chapter 9. 33:36 And when you're there, just say amen. 33:43 Verse 13 of Ecclesiastes Chapter 9 says, 33:46 "This wisdom have I seen also under the sun 33:50 and it seemed great unto me." 33:52 Now listen, if the wisest man in the world is saying 33:55 that this specific piece of wisdom is great, 33:58 we ought to listen. 34:00 Verse 14, he gives this story. 34:02 "There was a little city and few men within it. 34:06 And there came a great king against it and besieged it 34:09 and build great bulwarks against it. 34:12 Now there was found in it a poor wise man, 34:16 and he, by his wisdom, delivered the city, 34:19 yet no man remembered that poor man." 34:22 Friends, the city had few people. 34:26 It wasn't great. 34:28 There was nothing fantastic about this city. 34:30 But a great king came along and wanted to add it 34:33 to his list of conquests. 34:36 And so the people are subjugated, 34:37 there's no way in, there's no way out. 34:39 It looks like they are doomed 34:41 to suffer under his reign forever. 34:45 Until a man comes along and delivers them, 34:48 not by weapons, not by war, not by force but by wisdom, 34:53 yet no man remembers him. 34:56 Perhaps if he was a great man, a warrior or a soldier, 35:00 perhaps a man clad in costume with a fancy shield, 35:03 and he fought his way through the king's minions, 35:06 maybe then he would be remembered. 35:09 But no, he did so by wisdom. 35:11 And here's the thing, friends. 35:13 The reality is that if you do not take this charge 35:16 to step out in faith for God 35:17 and allow Him to use you to cause change, 35:20 if you choose to do that it might not be popular. 35:24 Your friends might look at you strange, 35:27 your family might mock you, 35:28 even your church might turn up their noses against you, 35:31 but we are not in this work to be remembered. 35:36 We are not here so that our names would be on videos 35:39 and in magazines and newspapers. 35:44 Friends, the Bible says that if Christ is lifted up, 35:48 all men shall be drawn unto him. 35:50 Friends, Jesus is that poor wise man. 35:54 Satan came to this poor planet with few men within it. 35:58 He built great bulwarks against it and besieged it. 36:00 And it looked like 36:02 nobody was going to be able to deliver these people 36:05 until within the city that was found a poor wise man. 36:09 And the deliverance that Jesus brought was not by force. 36:12 It was by wisdom, the wisdom of the cross. 36:16 Friends, we are otherwise hopeless, 36:19 captives to sin and to Satan. 36:22 We have no way out of the city but for the cross of Christ. 36:27 It's the cross of Calvary 36:29 that makes the biggest difference. 36:31 It was Christ enduring that, 36:33 it was Christ suffering on that. 36:34 That is where our power comes from. 36:37 Our power for change comes not from prophetic charts. 36:41 It comes not from the health message, 36:43 nor does it come from a correct understanding 36:45 of end-time events, 36:47 our power comes from the cross of Calvary. 36:51 And just as Jonathan was moved by the divine impulse 36:54 if we keep our eyes on Calvary, 36:56 there will be a divine impulse that follows everything 37:00 that we do too. 37:02 It is that cross, when lifted up, 37:05 when carried on your shoulders 37:07 that will propel you in your lives 37:10 from making a difference to making the difference. 37:15 Be that poor wise man, look for the impossible. 37:19 Look for the situations where you have to simply put 37:21 all of your trust in God. 37:23 And then go forward. 37:25 Pray for that wisdom. Pray for that divine impulse. 37:28 Pray for that faith that you would have 37:30 to go wherever God is leading. 37:34 Friends, the reason why no one has changed the world yet 37:39 is because we haven't changed the world yet. 37:42 And the reason why we haven't changed the world yet 37:44 is because you and I haven't changed the world yet. 37:48 We cannot expect our church to do it for us. 37:51 We must go forward as Christ has commissioned 37:53 and be the church. 37:55 We must seek to make the difference everywhere 37:58 that we are, everywhere we go. 38:00 We should be looking to show people 38:03 an accurate picture of the gospel. 38:14 Today, friends, I would like to invite you 38:18 to reignite your walk with Jesus Christ. 38:23 The call to be a crazy Christian 38:26 goes out to you today. 38:28 Go crazy for Jesus in the mission field, 38:30 don't try and be normal. 38:33 Go crazy for Him in the workplace, 38:35 crazy for Him at school, look for the impossible. 38:39 Look for opportunities to make a difference 38:41 and then allow God to work in you. 38:44 My appeal to you this evening is for those of you 38:47 that have allowed your Christianity 38:49 and your relationship with Jesus Christ 38:51 to become normal. 38:55 To those that have allowed their zeal to simmer, 38:59 to those that have stayed in the background in unbelief, 39:02 not sure that God could use them, 39:04 friends, heaven is at your disposal 39:07 if you trusted Him to guide you. 39:12 And so I invite you if you feel as though the Holy Spirit 39:15 is moving on your heart this evening, 39:17 to reignite that relationship with Jesus Christ, 39:20 to choose today to give Him your heart, 39:23 and allow God to work through GYC in your life, 39:27 to experience the transformation 39:30 that you have been waiting for years, 39:32 maybe for decades, God is giving you, 39:35 you personally an opportunity to start all over again. 39:40 Friend, that fire can be relit, 39:43 that relationship can be revived, 39:48 your walk with Jesus could be everything 39:51 that you wanted to be and more. 39:54 If that's your will this evening, 39:56 I invite you to stand to your feet 39:57 and to come forward. 39:59 If that's your will, if you want to restart 40:01 that walk with Christ this evening, 40:03 we invite you here to the front. 40:09 As you're coming forward, 40:11 I'd like to take your minds back 40:13 to the book of numbers 40:17 where Jesus Christ, in John Chapter 3 said, 40:20 this is the picture of the cross, 40:22 "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, 40:25 so must the Son of Man be lifted up." 40:28 You remember the story? 40:31 The people of Israel 40:32 were attacked by bronze serpents, 40:35 fiery serpents, 40:36 they were bitten and many of them were dying. 40:39 And so Moses by the command of God 40:41 erected a bronze serpent, put it on a pole. 40:46 I said if you want to be saved, come here and look, 40:50 and if you look, you will be saved. 40:52 So they would come, and they would look, 40:55 and they'll be healed. 40:56 And then what happens after that healing 40:58 is they would turn around, and they would go home, 41:00 back to their tents, 41:02 but they would go back to their tents 41:03 and guess what was waiting for them, 41:05 serpents, and they will get bitten again. 41:07 "Oh, it hurts, I'm dying, I'm losing my grip on life." 41:11 And so do you know where they go? 41:12 They'd go straight back, they'd go back to the pole, 41:15 back to the serpent on the pole, 41:16 the representative of Christ, 41:17 taking all of our sins upon his own shoulders, 41:20 and then they experience healing. 41:21 And then they'd go back to the tent, 41:23 they'd get bitten again, and they'd go back there 41:25 and look up and they'd be healed. 41:26 This up and down, backwards and forwards relationship 41:29 with Jesus Christ that you and I know all too well. 41:34 Friends, can I give you some advice? 41:36 You don't have to keep leaving. 41:39 You don't have to keep going back 41:41 to where you came from. 41:43 And then when you realize everything is a mess, 41:45 go back and look for Jesus. 41:46 It doesn't have to be that way. 41:47 Here's my advice. Go home. 41:50 Go home, pick up your tent. 41:52 Pick up everything you have, everything you own 41:58 and drop it right there. 42:00 Drop it at the very feet of Jesus Christ. 42:05 Live there. 42:07 This is not a guarantee that the serpents won't come 42:09 and bite you still, because they might, 42:11 but you're right there. 42:14 And if you keep the cross of Calvary 42:17 ever before you everything that you do 42:21 will be marked by the presence of God. 42:25 A divine impulse awaits every mission trip 42:28 that is lined up. 42:30 Every sermon that is gonna be preached, 42:31 every door that is going to be knocked here at GYC. 42:36 The Spirit of God wants to use you. 42:40 Friends, I'll be honest, I'm tired. 42:43 Tired of all of this. 42:45 I'm tired of GYCs as well. 42:48 I mean, it's great. 42:50 But can you imagine heaven? 42:52 How many more of these are we gonna have? 42:54 How many more revivals are we gonna need? 42:57 How many more times are you going to be like, 42:58 "Oh, God, I'm just gonna wait for you 43:00 to spark me back into life." 43:01 Why can't it be now? 43:03 Why can't it be you? 43:05 Why can't you be the Jonathan that we need today? 43:08 Why can't you go forward and change the world? 43:13 Friends, it's here, and only here. 43:16 And by here I mean at the foot of Calvary's cross 43:20 that we can change the world. 43:23 And so I invite you this evening 43:26 to come a little closer. 43:28 Come a little closer to Jesus. 43:31 Lay all of your plans at His feet 43:34 and ask Him to make the difference in your life 43:39 as you strive to make a difference 43:41 in the lives of others. 43:43 Friends, God wants to change the world 43:47 for the last time 43:50 and He wants to use you to do it. 43:52 Father in heaven, we thank You, Lord. 43:55 We are humbled by the fact that You would call us 44:00 to be co-workers with you in the plan of salvation. 44:04 Father, I pray especially for the people 44:06 gathered here at GYC 44:08 and those that are watching at home and online, 44:10 that Father, You would fill us with the same courage 44:14 and holy boldness that you filled Jonathan 44:16 and his armor bearer. 44:18 Lord, I don't care how many people, 44:20 how many obstacles 44:21 or how many enemies stand before us. 44:24 One man shall make 1,000 run, 44:27 2 shall put 10,000 to flight. 44:30 Why? Because, Lord, you fight for us. 44:33 Give us that faith. 44:35 Give us that dependence that we can find 44:38 only at the cross of Calvary. 44:40 Use us, Lord, to change this world 44:42 for the last time to make the difference. 44:46 This is our prayer in the name of Jesus. 44:50 Amen. |
Revised 2020-08-14