How To Consecrate Your Life For God’s Purposes | Fight The Good Fight | Pastor Josh Howerton

Every week, release a podcast that corresponds to the sermon, it's like a little bit of a deeper dive where we hit some things that didn't make it into the sermon, some theological concepts. We talk about things that are going on in our culture and how to think about them from a biblical perspective. We call that podcast Live Free, an episode releases every Monday that corresponds to the sermon. If you would like to check out Live Free, just go to the Lake Point YouTube channel and look for the podcast tab there. We'll see you at Live Free. Now, enjoy this Bible teaching. - All right, man, good morning Lake Point family. It's good to see y'all. Hey, can we say, hey listen man, can we all do this? The NFL is back on TV. Come on, somebody, in Jesus name, all righty man. Texas fans, how you feeling? All right, man. That was a good way to spend this Saturday night. Hey, do you want to do this sketch in Bible? Send it over to Second Timothy chapter four. Second Timothy chapter four is gonna be. Let me do this real quick. We in two weeks, we've got like, it's one of my three favorite services we have all year. We got our baptism weekend services coming up.

It's actually in two weeks. So let me do this. We have had an insane number of people who by the grace of God and the power of God have bent your knee to the lordship of Jesus Christ in the last two months. This little kind of blow my mind a little bit since the beginning of the movie is up to now. We've had over 4,000 people indicate a first time decision to follow Christ sometime in our service, man. That's awesome, it's awesome. Now, hey, if you're one of those people, let me just be your pastor for a second and just say something. If you're one of those, let me talk to you real quick. Listen, when you did that, what you did not do is you didn't just receive the grace of Jesus Christ as your savior, although you got that and there ain't nothing better than that. You also, you bent your knee to the lordship of Jesus Christ as your Lord and as your leader. And what that means is that you are now, you're not just a recipient of grace. You are a disciple of Jesus Christ and a disciple. Here's what that means. It just means follower. And so you cannot be following somebody and standing still at the same time. So the question you should be asking as a new follower of Jesus Christ

is what steps should I be taking to follow my Lord more closely? And the first step that he asks you to take is the step of being baptized. That means like dunked after you are saved in baptism. And all that means is it's going public with your faith in Jesus Christ. So I say this all the time, let me say it again. Man, we should not live in a world where the world has the courage to come out of the closet for unrighteousness, but the people of God don't have the courage to come out of the closet, to go public for Team Jesus. And so man, you need to be the kind of person. It's like, man, I'm in Team Jesus, let's go. So if you've never done that, I want you to text the word life to the number 20411. We'll get you signed up. We'll get you baptized in two weeks, gonna be a big party and hey, like my family, we're gonna be celebrating those people that day, right? Come on, somebody, that's it, man. That's awesome. All right, well, let's get into the word. We are in week, I think it's five of a series called "Fight the Good Fight" through Second Timothy. And here's all this series is. The book of Second Timothy is the Apostle Paul, a senior saint whose age started with a five or a six. He's on his essentially deathbed in prison.

And he's pouring out these words to this young little spiritual son, a man named Timothy whose age started with a two or three. Now, let me give you the sermon in one sentence today. And let me go there. Here's sermon in one sentence. "The direction of your life, not the intentions "of your life, determine the destination of your life." Let me say that more time. Direction not intention will determine your destination. So the analogy I wanna use is, man, if you were planning to go on vacation to Galveston, first of all, I'm judging you a little and I'm praying for you. But if you're doing that, man, what you could do is listen, you can do all the things to get ready to go to Galveston. You can take off the time off of work. You can pack up. You can get your Galveston playlist together. You can get your appropriately modest bathing suit packed up and all the things and be ready. You can plan the entirety. You can put it in Apple Maps and do all the things. You can be already to have intentions to go to Galveston. But if you get in your truck and you hop on I-35 North, I don't care what your intentions are, you ain't going to Galveston. You can be praying about going to Galveston. You can be listening to songs about Galveston. George Strait, All Maxes, Livin' Texas, Alsons, Galveston. You can do all the things, all the things.

If you're on 35 North, your direction, not your intentions, are going to determine your destination. Now, let me just apply this to your life financially. If I were to ask you, hey, where do you want to be in 10 years financially? What nobody says is I want to be broke and in debt. That's ain't nobody's intention. But for some of you, the direction of your life, the actual decisions that you're making, they're putting you on a path for broke and in debt. And in all matter what your intentions are, if your master card functions like your master card, you are a slave to that thing. I'll give you another one physically Our light. Hey man. Where you want to be in ten years? No one in this room is be like. I want to look like a trash bag full of water. Nobody But for some of you The decisions that you're making you're doing what I do you're running a cost-benefit analysis on What you eat and where you go and it just comes down to want versus need it's like I want abs, but I need tacos, okay? Okay, I hear you Directions not intention determine destination of your life now. That's what the Apostle Paul is telling Timothy here spiritually The decisions you make the direction you set is going to determine where you end up spiritually And he's gonna tell Timothy this matters more than anything in your life So get in the word with me start with me verse 20. It says this now in a great house by the way He's talking about the church. Hey Lake Point family. Can we just say this? Hey Lake Point family? I love you so much I've been praying for you for two weeks. It's so good to see you again. Can I say something? This is a great house It's a great house, man. We got 3,700 people in rooted right now being discipled maybe for the first time in their life We're gonna baptize more than 500 people in two weeks. We will have in two weeks baptize more than 3,000 people Just this year met glory to God give him glory man. Let's give glory to God man. This is a great house And it's not listen. Hey, it's not about a speaker. It's not about a leader

It's not about a person. It's about a savior a great savior makes it a great house So the Apostle Paul's going hey in a great house, and he's gonna use this analogy There's two types of vessels. He says there's not only everybody say the word vessels one two three There are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay Some for honorable use and some for dishonorable now I want to let me show you this real quick what he's talking about right here going toss it up There's some it is a first-century Roman vessel a cup And it's called a magisterium. There's another word for it and what it is here is watch this because of what it's made of and Because it was kept clean and because it was empty It could be used for a great purpose now because we're in church. Go and put that other picture up there. There you go Let me do that Now come back to me and what the Apostle Paul is saying is hey You're a vessel. We are vessels in jars of clay and depending upon he says man if somebody keeps himself clean and They can just stay empty a vessel for God to pour his power in says if you'll keep yourself clean and empty It's used for an honorable use a dignitary a special person comes over to the house I'm gonna bring out the good vessel. I'm gonna put it whereby I can see it and I'm gonna use it for a noble purpose But then he says there are other people in the house who they're still in the house But because of the decisions they make in their life is the analogies using there's another type of vessel And this is legit what he's talking about. There's other vessels who they're not clean and Then they're made out of things that are less noble and he talks about vessels of clay for quote-unquote Honorable use. This is what he's talking about. This is literally a first-century chamber pot That's literally that's a first-century squatty potty. That's what he's talking about Come back to me and he's saying that you are going to make a choice Are you gonna be a person who stands before God and you pursue holiness and you stay clean and you stay empty of self? So God can pour his power into you if so you're gonna see in a second God can use anybody like that for a noble purpose But then there's other Christians and they are Christians. This is what Paul's saying They are Christians, but they live for minimums They never pursue holiness They have no elevated spiritual vision for their life and their legacy

For generations to come out of their family to be thrown haymakers for the kingdom of God And so they don't stay empty they're full of their own pride and and they they don't stay clean They're not holy and so they're vessels that are in the house But you sort of keep them in places nobody sees and they're not used for honorable use. Hey Lake Point family Here's what I've been praying for you for two weeks that this church would be 30,000 people who stand before God and say use me for a noble purpose God I want to be the person who's used for a noble purpose. I don't want to live for minimums There is a a quote. I came across this week by Bishop JC. Ryle. He said this There is a common worldly kind of Christianity in this day Which many have and think they have enough a cheap Christianity which offends nobody requires no sacrifice which costs nothing and is worth nothing I Mean this and come back to me in the very literal sense to hell with that. I don't want that anywhere We want that in the pits of hell I want to live such a life that when I die, all of hell rejoices, I'm out of the fight. And one of our elders said this to me recently, kind of tweaked that language. He said, I want to be the kind of man that when my alarm goes off in the morning, the devil says, crap, he's up. And I'm allowed to say that word 'cause Mike Brose said it last week in his sermon. Let me say that. Now, can I be honest, some of you right now, you're living a life, and I'm just gonna shoot you straight, you're living a life right now where the direction of your life is moving towards the destination of you wasting your life and being used for dishonorable purposes, hidden, minimum purposes.

That's what we are. And you look at Christians around you who are living lives of bold faith, risk taking agency before the Lord. They want to be used greatly by God. And you'll watch the decisions they make and you think they're crazy because you're like, hey, man, you may look at somebody like me or somebody around you be like, hey, man, some of the decisions you make, they make your life harder. They were sold in more opposition from this world. That requires faith. You're sacrificing things you could have enjoyed. And you're looking around and you're asking the question from a heart of selfishness going, man, why would you ever do that? I want to answer that question. We would do that one because we are disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. We signed up to follow that man who was willing to go to a cross and die for us. And if he gave his all for us, we can give his all for him. I want to do that because I don't want to get to the end of my life and realize I wasted it, succeeding at things that did not matter. I want to get to the end of my life and hear, well done. I don't want to get to the end of my life and hear God say something like, well, guess you're done. I don't want that because I want my, listen,

I want to live this kind of life because I want my great-grandkids telling stories about their great-grandfather that he's hugging Jesus now. But when that man was alive, he was a problem for the kingdom of hell. I want generations after I'm God. Here's why I'm doing this right now. Here's why I wrote this down. I want you to hear, I have a very imperfect disciple, but I want you to hear the inner workings of the heart of somebody who wants to follow Jesus. I want to live this kind of life because generations after I'm gone, I want people on this planet with my last name, throwing haymakers for the kingdom of God long after I'm hugging Jesus because I live faithfully before him to the best of my ability while I still had days. And I don't just change my life. I change my legacy and my lineage as I stand before my Lord. So listen, this is why you want to live for a noble purpose. Now, good news, some of you are like, well, I'm never gonna be able to do that. My life's real jacked up. I got good news for you, verse 21. Paul says, therefore, if, and everybody say that, underline word out loud, if,

if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use. Set apart his holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good word. Now, let me explain you real quick. I'm gonna use two theological words. I'm gonna use the word condemnation of the word of redemption. Let me explain why some of you, when you hear that, you're like, bro, that can never be me. You're looking at something jacked up in your life, something jacked up in your past. You're like, I could never be fit for that type of use. That is a theological word. It's called condemnation. Now, I want to explain this real quick. The first time I ever kind of really grasped this, I was down, Jan and I went on a mission trip to New Orleans, right after Katrina. And we were driving past all these houses that where builders had inspected them and decided that they were condemned. And we saw posters like this. And you'll see that word. It's a Bible word, but it's also a builder word. If you're a GC, you're in construction, you're used to this, it said condemned. That's a Bible word, but it's also a builder word. And if you look at one of those condemned things, what it does is look at, look it right there.

What it says is, condemn means unfit for use. That's what it means. So when a builder condemns something, come back to me, when a builder condemns something, what they do is they look at some aspect of the house this messed up and they decide based on that one thing, they slap a label on it and they decide that it'll be unfit for use forever. So they go, hey man, busted up slab, unfit for use, rotting in the framing, unfit for use, asbestos in the lining, unfit for use. What the Bible says is that the devil, what he does is he does condemnation. The book of Revelation says that the devil is, quote, the accuser of the brethren, that he accuses the saints every day and every night. And what he does is he does condemnation and he goes to your life just like a builder points at something jacked up with a building and goes based on that, here's your label, unfit for use. What the devil does is he goes around to every Christian, he points to something jacked up in your life now or jacked up in your life in the past and he'll point at that thing and go, based on that, here's your label, condemned, unfit for use. So look at somebody like you and go, hey man, you had an abortion, unfit for use. Two time divorce, say unfit for use. You struggle with your porn addiction, unfit for use. But I got good news, while the devil's doing condemnation,

my Bible tells me that there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, for the law of the spirit of life set us free from the law of sin and death, and that where the devil does condemnation, Jesus Christ does redemption. Do you know what redemption is? Redemption is a Bible word, it can mean this. It can just mean that he can take one thing and turn it into another thing. Oh man, Lord help me preach this. He can take one thing and turn it into another thing. It's like guys, you know this, when your wife redeems a coupon, what she does is she takes one thing, she turns it into another thing, she goes to the store, she takes a piece of paper, and she turns it into a box of Clorox, or a box of brownies, or she takes a piece of paper, and she turns it into whatever water bottle the secret society of women decided it was the one this year, you know, whatever it is. What she does is she takes one thing and she turns it into another thing. Can I tell you something? My God can take a man who was one thing, and he could turn him into another thing. That's what he could, he could relieve you. Man, every now and then,

we got this ministry at Lake Point, and if you're one of them, I wanna hear you right now. You got a ministry at Lake Point called Regent, where are my Regent folks at? Regent folks, that's it. And every now and once somebody will do, if everybody needs to do Regent at least one in your life, it's just once in your life, it's just discipleship for people with her tablets and hang ups, just discipleship. And every now and we'll be doing baptisms and somebody getting baptized, they'll say that they got saved in Regent, and when they say that, the Regent folks, they'd make that little noise they just made, they'd go crazy. And sometimes people in the lobby, they'll grab me and they'll be like, "Hey Josh, those Regent people," this is what they'll say. They get this look on their eye and they say, "Those Regent people, they get a little crazy." Okay? And I always say the same thing, I always grab them, I got a little righteous indignation and I always say, "Hey man, let me grab you, let me tell you something about those people who you were pointing at." And they were worshiping their faces off, hands up, tears down, glory up, open heavens.

By the way, that's me over there every week. Hands up, tears down, glory up, open heavens, open Bible, all the things. And you're making fun of those people. And I'm always like, "Hey man, those people we were making fun of, let me tell you something about those people." That one dude you were making fun of, I know some things about that guy, that guy was an addict and now he's free. I'll say, "Hey man, that other guy you were making fun of, here's what she didn't know about that guy." That guy was in prison and today he walked in worshiping with his Christian family. And that lady you were making fun of, she was suicidal and today she's here, she's got a hope and a future. That other one, "Hey man, I can keep going." That other one, that guy, his last year's wife filed for divorce, today they walked in holding hands, they got a new marriage, same spouse, why? Because my God couldn't take one thing and he inserted in to another thing. If anyone is willing to cleanse himself from what is dishonorable, they'll be a vessel for honorable use, okay? Now the question is how? Give us what Paul does in the next verse, watch this. So flee youthful passions, he says. And pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace,

along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart, youthful passions. Now, I've been praying over this passage for a little bit. So this is like what I agonize over this stuff as a preacher, I'm like, how do I explain what youthful passions are? I don't talk about youthful passions a lot in my everyday life, okay? Here's my best shot. Youthful passions, it's all the stuff that Godly senior saints look at and go, that's so stupid, those are all youthful passions. Godly senior saints look at stuff and they go, that's so dumb, they're all youthful passions. Paul shows us three, now here's all I want you to do. I want you to ask the Holy Spirit in the next couple minutes, which one of these three, Lord, do I need to be cleansed from by the power of the Spirit? So I can be a vessel for honorable use. Three, here you go, number one. Number one is lusts. So the word that gets translated passions is the Greek word epithemia. Epa is a Greek prefix that means over, thumia means desire. He's talking about just any over desire, but especially the Bible uses it for sexual desire. Now listen, this is a big deal, man. Paul's writing this letter to a young guy whose age starts with a two or three

in a sexually perverse culture. Heads up, who our churches reach in a ton of young families, young dudes, people walking through the door, age started with a two or a three or a young four, that kind of thing. You are living in a culture that is very sexually perverse. You need this word that Timothy needed when Paul wrote Second Timothy. And Paul warns this young man. He says, hey man, you flee from sexual immorality and you flee from lusts of the flesh, flee from these things. I say this all the time, I repeat myself for emphasis, not out of laziness. When you look at the Bible, it's fascinating. Ephesians 6, 11 says that if the devil attacks you, That's Ephesians 6.11. But then 1 Corinthians 6.18 says to flee from sexual immorality. So the Bible is literally painting this picture. If you walk into your car and the literal actual devil is there. Horn's tail, red cape, all the things. If he's there, the Bible is saying, bow up, take your stand against the evil one. That's what Ephesians says. But if you walk out of your car on a work trip and some little shady coworker in a miniskirt is there, run for us, run, you are no match for this enemy. That's what that's saying. Now, why? Check this out.

Proverbs 6.27. So here's what the book of Proverbs is. All Proverbs is-- people never think about this. The book of Proverbs is just a godly dad writing a letter to his son about how he wants him to grow in the faith with his life and maximize his impact. That's all the book of Proverbs is. It's a parenting book. That's all Proverbs is. A dad writing to his son. An enormous amount of the book is warning his son to flee from what Proverbs calls the seductive woman. Now, you could transmit it if he was writing to a daughter. He'd say the same thing for a dude, but check this out. He tells his son about lust. He says, can a man scoop fire into his lap and not be burned? So here's the analogy. If we're all hanging around the fire pit, we get down on a fire and everybody-- we're all done. We're packing up. Everybody pours the last little drops of their refreshment in the fire to watch it go. Everybody does the thing. Everybody does. And then we're like, we need to put out the fire. And one guy sits down next to the fire, buries his hands in the burning embers of the fire, flames still going. Half burned logs start scooping them up to his chest

to carry him away. And then he does it. And he goes, whoa. And he throws it down. And everybody's like, Richard, what are you doing? By the way, if your name's Richard, I'm real sorry. Sorry. Richard, what are you doing? And Richard goes, well, dang, man. I know for 6,000 years since we discovered fire, it burned every single person. I just thought I'd be different. Everybody go, bless your heart, Richard. You too dumb to talk to. You're never invited to the fire pit ever again. That's what we'd all say. The Bible is saying that about you when you do not flee from sexual immorality. No one has ever darkened the door of sexual immorality and not been burned by it. You will be burned. He's saying this to Timothy. I'm just going to tell you this, man. If you are right now, tip towing towards an affair. You got a work life. You got a work husband. You're doing a little DM thing. Nobody knows about you sliding into that, whatever it is. Right now, hear the voice of the Lord through his word. Warning you not to burn down your life.

Warning you. You think, I've seen it too many times in church. You think it starts feeling cool and exciting and exhilarating. It ends with some other dude tucking your kids in a bed at night for the next 20 years. Can a man scoop fire into his chest and not be burned? Man, many of you, you wrestle with pornography issues and you're like, man, victimless sin, victimless sin. That's a sucker punch and you're the sucker. You're the victim. You're the victim. It's degrading your soul. It's the termites in the foundation of your marriage and your future marriage. You're leaving a covenantal portal. I don't know how else to say it. Open for the enemy to pass that same sin down. Generation to generation in your family. And I just want to say this, man. Some of you are staying up late every night in front of a glowing computer screen. All the lights off doing degrading things. Can I say something to you? You are a redeemed son or daughter of the most high God. You don't belong in that low place. You don't, can a man scoop fire to his chest and not be burned? He says, flee from this thing. Number two, not just lust. He says, flee from stupid fights.

This is what I need to hear. Flee from stupid fights. Why does he say that's a youthful passion? Any parent knows stupid fights are for kids. Children fight about stupid stuff. I got three, 15, 11, seven. Changes every year, I gotta think about it. 15, 11, seven. It's like, hey dude, I don't have my time. Who cares who had the Calico critter? Nobody cares. We got 30 calico critters. Why are we fighting about stupid stuff? The Apostle Paul is saying, hey man, please stupid fights, watch what he says. Have, next verse. Have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies. You know that they breed quarrels. I looked this up. Do you guys know what the Hebrew is? For foolish, stupid controversies. It's Twitter. What it is. And the Greek's Facebook, the Latin's Instagram, Aramaic's TikTok, I looked it up. I just wanna say this. "Gosh, why don't you respond to some of the things "people say about you on the internet?" Because I got a Bible verse that says, "Avoid foolish, ignorant controversies."

Avoid foolish, ignorant controversies. Why'd you respond to this? Here's why. Jesus didn't. Jesus did not respond to every question that he was asked. Very frequently, he was quote, silent before his accusers, or he would answer a question with a question. Why? Because he looked into the person and saw, you're not looking for an answer. You have ill intent. Anyway, I refuse to dignify the Bible says, "Not to answer a fool according to their folly." I got a mentor that said, "Arguable people on the internet is like wrestle with a pig. "You get dirty and a pig likes it." (congregation laughing) This is what he says to you. Look at, this is back up in verse 16. He says, "I can't wait to do this part of the sermon. "But avoid irreverent Babel, "for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness "and their talk will spread like gangrene." Everybody say, "Gangrene." All right, y'all ready for this? Throw that picture up there. Gangrene, look at it. That's right. That's from Wikipedia. No, don't look away.

Don't look away. You look at that. Look at that. I want you to have drank that in. Y'all hungry for lunch yet? I said, "Okay, let's do it." Keep looking at it. Gangrene says they're talking to us, "Keep looking, don't look away." Red shirt right there. I see you looking away. (congregation laughing) He says, "That's how damaging divisive talk." Gossip, where you're talking about someone instead of to them. That's how damaging it is to the body and check this out. There is no way to cure gangrene. The only thing you can do is cut it off. So church, with the Bible's telling you to do as a son or daughter of God, is cut it out of your life. We can take it down now. Cut it off, cut it out. This is why, by the way, that one of the most harsh verses of the New Testament, Titus 3, 10. Titus is the Siamese book for Second Timothy. Titus 3, 10, Paul tells another spiritual son about the church. He says, "Worn a divisive person once,

"then warn them again, "then have nothing to do with them." When you see an intentionally divisive person, you rebuke them or you remove them from your life. You rebuke them or you remove them from the church. The apostle Paul does this in Second Timothy. He calls out two dudes by name and picks a fight. He goes, "Phyleedus and Hameneas, "they're dividing the church. "They're teaching things that are contrary to sound doctrine, "picks a fight, pulls them out." What God wants you to do with your language, check this out, Proverbs 18, 21. It says, "Death and life are in the power of the tongue, "and those who love it will eat its fruits." Let me show you an analogy that the Howardton family has, you're never gonna forget it, it's gonna look real stupid, I don't care. What that verse means, it says, "Death and life in the power of the tongue, "those who love it will eat its fruits." By the way, that verse is where we in the English language get the phrase, "You're gonna eat your words," came from that. And what it's saying is that every time you speak a word, you're planting a seed. And all your life, you're either planting death or life with every word you speak. And not overnight, but over time, all the seeds you plant with your words

will grow up into either death or life. And your life right now is the fruit of you eating what you sowed in the past with your words. That's what I was saying. Now, here's what we say in the Howardton house, this is really helpful for little kids, you may think it's real stupid, I'm gonna do it anyway, you're never gonna forget it. What we say in the Howardton house is we're either gonna, with our tongues, we talk about a lot about how we use our tongues in our words in the Howardton house. We say we're either gonna have buzzard tongues or hummingbird tongues. As we say, are you gonna be a buzzard? Hey, we'll say this. Don't be a buzzard, be a hummingbird, as we'll say. And here's how it works. What a buzzard will do is a buzzard can fly, actually let me do a hummingbird first. What a hummingbird will do, you're never gonna forget it, I'm gonna help you remember it. A hummingbird. I'm not doing that, it's a little too zesty. I'm not doing that again. What a hummingbird will do is a hummingbird will fly over an entire desert of dead things, find the one living thing, and it will focus on that. A buzzard will do the exact opposite. It can fly over an entire forest of living things.

It'll find the one dead thing, and it will focus on that. Can I ask you a question? If you examine your, hey, husbands, in how you speak to and about your wife, buzzard or hummingbird, are you the type of husband who you can look at a wife who's going through a hard time? There are a lot of dead things. There's a lot of stuff that needs some sanctification in your life, but you're the type of man who you'll find the one area of life, beauty, grace, and goodness, and you'll use your tongue to focus. and whatever you starve, shrinks. Or are you the type of husband, the type of wife? Watch this, the type of mom, the type of dad. Hey parents, let me just remind you this. Our children will either live up to the blessings that come from our mouth, or they will live down to the curses that come from our mouth. Are you the type of mom, dad, husband, wife, who, man, there can be a thousand dead things in somebody's life, and your tongue will find the one living thing and focus on that. Buzzard or Hummingbird, the Bible says this, life and death are in the power of the tongue. Those who love it will eat its fruits. Now last thing, the apostle Paul says, flee from self, flee from self. He's gonna say, man, I'm being poured out. You're gonna see it next chapter.

I'm being poured out. Watch, what a mature, I'm gonna say this all time, I'm gonna keep saying it. Children live by their feelings and desires. Christians and adults live by their convictions and their commitments. Children live by their feelings and their desires. Christians and adults live by their convictions and their commitments. The apostle Paul in chapter four, he's gonna go, I, what's being poured out? I am my agenda, my desires, my rights. Christians need to stop talking to the church about my rights, no, no. Let's talk about responsibilities. I'm here to serve. Paul says, all these things are being emptied from me. I'm being poured out. In other words, he's emptied of his self. Children are very, very selfish. They're selfish, bro. They're so, they're selfish. You can have a bunch of kids come over to our house. One kid will touch a toy that our seven year old ain't played with in five years. And the second the neighbor kid touches it, I was playing with that. You don't play with that since 2021. And then you're like, okay, you had this one. Then they touched it.

I was playing with that too. Children are selfish. Paul saying, pour out the emptied of your own desires. You need to know this. Our culture, you are being discipled into self-focus everywhere you go. Watch the language our culture disciples you into. Everything's all about self-love, self-care, self-actualization, self-expression. We take selfies, not youis. But then we read this word and what does this word say? It says, die to yourself, Jesus says. Deny yourself. It talks about self-control. It glamorizes. It honors men and women who live self-sacrifice, who put a serving towel over their arm and prioritize the needs of other people over their own needs. Self, we are like this even in the church. People sometimes, very rarely because our worship team is awesome, awesome, awesome. Every now and then somebody who grabbed me would be like, I didn't like to worship today. I always say the same thing, that's fine, man. We weren't worshiping you anyway. We weren't worshiping you, bro. Yeah, like, hey, can I just remind us of this? Hey, let me just, yeah, I wanna make sure, you guys know this is not all about you.

Do we like all understand that? Like Jesus died for you. This is not all about you. This is not in my notes, but it's in my heart. Do you know why we call these things worship services? We're not serving you. We're serving him. That's where we're serving him. And the Apostle Paul is saying this, man, pour yourself out for these things. You gotta be, Leonard Ravenhill said, everybody wants to be filled with power. Nobody wants to be emptied of self. And in Philippians 2, the Bible says that Jesus emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, therefore God highly exalted him. It gave him the name that is above every name, all right? Let me put all this together and finish the sermon. So you gotta be clean, you gotta be empty. I want you to imagine this, I got a little, he's gonna help me in a second. I want you to imagine that tonight at 7.30 kickoff, you order a pizza, and you order the pizza. And when the pizza guy gets there, he knocks on the door, and when you open the door, the pizza guy is literally there bare-handing your pizza. It's just like the grease is dripping down. It's one of my favorite illustrations I've ever seen. Dripping down onto his arm, cheese flowing all over his grubby fingernails.

And he's just like, here's your pizza. And in that moment, I'd be going like, ah, do not pass code, do not collect $200, I'm out. Because man, I'm not a germaphobe, but I don't know where you've been, I don't know what your hands have been doing. I bless God, I don't know anything about you, brother. And in that moment, what I'd be asking, a question would become very important to me in that moment, that I'd never thought about how important it was before, in that moment, I'd be asking, brother, where is the box? Where's the box? Now listen, I have never thought about a pizza box before. I've just taken a very, never even, something that is watched, that is not very valuable at all. We have these treasures in jars of clay, the Bible says. A vessel that's not very valuable at all, it's not strong, it's not expensive, but in that moment, the vessel would become very important to me. And here's what you need to understand, is that, why watch, it's not important to me because the box is special or because the box is valuable. That box, 39 cents, 39 cents. Watch, it's not the box that gives value to the product, the product gives value to the box. Whenever God begins to move in you and pour his spirit in you and starts to work through you, you can't get puffed up, you can't begin thinking, it's me, because all it is is his power is made perfect in weakness,

he is filling you, he is the one that gives the value, not the vessel, not you, but here in that moment, watch this, when the piece is there, it's like, man, when I'm going, where is the box, brother? There's two things that I need in a vessel that carries something that's important to me, I need two things, I just need it to be clean and I need it to be empty, and if it's just clean and empty, then you can put something important in it to me and it can be a vessel for something honorable, for honorable use, can I say something to you? You don't gotta be awesome, you don't gotta be talented, you don't gotta look like a movie star, you don't gotta have a lot of amazing talents, all you gotta do is you gotta stand before your Lord and be willing to be clean and empty, and if you'll be clean and empty, he'll put his power in you and use you for noble purposes. He'll do that for you, ma'am, well listen, watch how it ends, go ahead and do that little keys thing, yeah, go ahead and start. (congregation laughing) So he finishes the passage and he says this, so you need to run away from youthful passions, but you need to run towards these things, watch. Pursue righteousness, faith, pursue love, pursue peace, along with those who call on the Lord from pure heart, all week, I just want you to do this week, all week, you just have your eyes open.

Righteousness, where do I see it? Love, faith, let me, I'm gonna run towards peace. Let me give you an example of this. So this week, how I write my sermons, I take these really long walks and when it's really hot outside, I get really sweaty. And I just take long walks, I just pray for you. People think I'm insane. I've had people be like, "Hey, man, are you okay?" Like literally, "Hey, are you okay?" 'Cause I just walk, I'm talking, I'm praying out loud, I'm worshiping my face. Sometimes I'm like, worshiping middle of the road, I look like an idiot. And that's how I take a walk, so I write a sermons. And listen, man, this week, I was praying a lot for you. So I think it was on Tuesday. I was taking a walk, I was out towards Forney and shout out Forney campus. And I was out there and there, about 100 yards away, I saw a car that clearly recognized me 'cause they started veering. Now that has gone poorly for me before. Let me just say, I live a very peculiar life. My entire life is either five star reviews or one star reviews, nothing in between. That's my whole life. So whenever somebody is pulling over, I'm like, that's gonna go one of two very different ways. Let's roll the dice and see what's happening.

That's my day. And this girl gets out and she's there. And I'm there and I've been praying for you. Man, I was just like, I'm in the middle of praying, my cheeks are all sweaty, these cheeks, by the way. That's the up here. And something, let's keep going. And I'm there and she gets out and she's like, pastor. You're my pastor. I'm so sorry for interrupting you. Let me just say something real quick. Never apologize for interrupting me and Janna if you see us in public. Now if I'm with my kids, that's different. Let me be a dad. If I'm with Janna, never apologize for that. I became pastor 'cause I love people. Never apologize for that. Man, Janna can't keep your hands off me and I need to break anyway. So let's grasp. Don't plead in the room. And this girl, she's like, hey, pastor, would you pray for it? And we get there and she's a little tear pops out and she feels like maybe that's not the right time. She'd push it back and she's like, man, I didn't know if I could bring myself to do this. I just feel like I just needed you to pray for me. And so I'm like, huh, let's go.

She's got her car parked in the middle of the lane. Terrible citizen, great Christian, all these. And we just turned and rode into a quick prayer meeting. I'm just laying in my prayer. There were two cars while we were praying that honked while we were there and I thought, oh man, they're angry. that's what they said and pray for this girl and And then I got an email later in the week they got began to move in her life And my stuff started to happen and here's here's all I'm saying here's my question to you When's the last time you made a decision with your life that required faith? Direction not intention determines destination some of you. This is real obvious I want you need to ask what that thing is some of this Rob is you never been baptized before boom You know exactly what it is text live two zero four one. You need to get dumped. That's an act of faith You know what it is, but every Christian at Lake Point every disciple at Lake Point We need to be able to answer the question. How do I pursue faith this week and take a step that requires it So I want to pray that for you right now. Would you bow your heads and close your eyes and Father now a lot of time. I'm praying for the people today. I'm praying with the people. Thank you Thank you for being willing to use weak vessels To deposit your power in because your power is made perfect in weakness Father would you please lead us and pass the righteous? Show us what the thing is Jesus that we can do as a disciple this week to walk nearer to our Lord We love you and we pray those things in the crucified risen name of our Savior and all guys people said amen amen amen amen