Obedience Opens the Door to God's Blessings — Shane Idleman

Obedience in a Rebellious Culture

We need to pass down obedience in this rebellious culture. Do we have a rebellious culture? I'm always reminded they will be stiff-necked, they will be rebellious to parents, they will not want authority, they won't be want under authority, they'll be lovers themselves and not lovers of God, and we see this happening now, so we must pass down obedience.

It opens the door to God's blessing. Let me say this, just hear me for a minute. Whether you're hungry, don't look at your phone, listen here for a minute. If you want to be blessed of God, if you want to be used of God, if you want God to fill you with his spirit this morning, get back on the track of obedience.

Repentance Restores the Flow of the Spirit

If there's a disconnect, if there's an error in your life he has been working with you on and you're still rebelling and rebelling and rebelling, I ask, I plead this morning that you repent of that and get back on the track of obedience.

Obedience is a wonderful word. Those who obey my word, the Bible says, the humble he teaches his way, and the humble are always those who obey God's word. What area, what area could you be slipping in?

Is there an addiction? Is there living in sexual sin? Is there flirting with the occult or witchcraft? Doing things that you shouldn't be doing, but I'm a Christian, things are going okay, but I'm talking to those who want to get back in the flow of the Holy Spirit.

You know what that is? Have you ever been that, when God's spirit is working through you, and you just can't wait to get in God's word. You can't wait to get to church. You can't wait to worship. Oh, I just love, and then disobedience knocks you off track.

And then you just go through the motions. But God loves us so much that he wants to pull us back into that place of obedience. And I should clarify, I'm not talking about perfection or I wouldn't be up here.

I would go sit down if I was talking about perfection. But it's a heart that when he falls, he gets back up and gets on the right path. See, the problem isn't always, hear what I'm saying. The problem isn't that we fall sometimes, which is not good.

Rising After Spiritual Failure

The problem is we stay down. We don't get back up and get back on track. We fall and we stay down. And we stay in that point of disobedience. And now because I'm in a state of disobedience, I'm gonna continue in my disobedience.

What God wants me to come out of, I'm gonna stay in it. Because I'm beat down. There's shame and there's guilt. That's why I want to remind you that God is not scared by your past. He knows people fall.

But it's those who look up when they fall. It's those who fall forward. Though the steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, though he falls, he will not be utterly cast down because the Lord holds him up with his right hand.

If we had time, I could take you to what the right hand of God is. The right hand of the Father. It's not a physical hand. God is spirit and those who worship him must worship him in spirit and truth.

But the right hand is a symbol of power and authority. That's why when the conquering king returns again, his eyes blazing and on his head many crowns and the armies of heaven are following after it. It says on his thigh, on his right thigh was written king of kings and Lord of lords.

It's this right position of power and authority. So God says, I'll put you back up into a position of power and authority if you get back on track and if you fully surrender again to my calling and to my will and to my purpose in your life.

Redemption Through Troubled Lineages

I just wanna close with that point. You got a few minutes here, of course. But your past doesn't scare God. If your past does not scare God, I'm gonna say something here that's gonna upset the Pharisee.

Did you know if you trace the line, the lineage of where Jesus came from, they mention in the line there, Rahab the harlot. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Rahab the harlot, when the walls of Jericho came down and she spared the spies, she was known as a harlot.

And somehow she hung out the court of redemption to where her whole house was spared during that raid against Jericho Joshua fought in. And Rahab the harlot, I don't remember the exact, but begot Obed and Obed begot Jesse and Jesse begot David.

And there's a line down there from Jesus and they put it in the Bible. The line of Jesus, if you keep following Rahab the harlot, what is that? That's out of place. Because all those people had sin. We're gonna judge Rahab the harlot, but not David the murderer and the adulterer, not Abraham the schemer, Jacob.

Jacob's name actually means trickster, trickster. He's a little sneaky guy. That's why God wrestled with him and said, you're no longer Jacob. Your name is now Israel, Israel, because you have fought with God and prevailed and I will change your name.

It's so powerful to understand that God uses your past. Don't stay in the mud, pig. Get out of the mud and let God clean you. Don't wallow in it. Don't continue to allow your, the past, our past is preventing a lot of people from doing anything in ministry.

You might not hear it as much as me, but I hear it a lot. Shane, you don't know what I've done. You don't know what I've been through. God's not gonna use me. I struggle with this, I struggle with that.

God Cleanses and Completes His Work

Well, let me just tell you the truth. We all struggle with something. Every great writer of the Bible struggled with something. Now, I'm not validating sin. You know me, I preach against it. I think people should fall forward.

I don't think we should have unconfessed sin in our lives. But if we wait until, okay, all right, this year in 2020, I'm gonna clean up my life, I'm not gonna sin, I'm gonna walk holy, I'm gonna fast, and then God's gonna use me.

Hmm, you're gonna be waiting a lifetime. All those things are good and I don't minimize any of those things. But God wants us to come to him, what? As we are. You gotta get out of your mind, you clean yourself up.

God cleans you up. Yes, we can make choices that lead to holy living. We can live right. We can make certain decisions where we live close to the Father. But at the end of the day, it's God who cleans you up.

If you begin a good work in yourself, you will complete it. That didn't even sound good, that's ugh. If God began a good work in you, he will complete it. He will finish it, he will restore. But listen, you gotta get on the right path.

Difficult Choices for Spirit-Filled Obedience

You gotta get on the right path. You gotta align your will with God's will. You gotta obey certain areas. You gotta make decisions that are tough. I've known people that are here now, they're worshiping God, it's incredible, but they've been living together with someone for years.

They were dead spiritually. They couldn't break out of it. And they had every excuse in the book. But finally, once they made that disconnect and they sought God with all their heart and there was tears and it was hard, the spirit of the living God filled them up.

I know others have been addicted to certain things and addiction just pulls them back and pulls them back. But when they make that decision, I'm gonna follow Christ, I'm gonna give these things up, and they starve the flesh, they begin to be filled again with the spirit of God.

Humility, Mercy, and Spiritual Restoration

That's why the enemy keeps coming back and trying to pull us back into the, the enemy knows he can't, I don't believe a person can just lose their salvation. You know that. But I believe the enemy can harass.

I believe the enemy can pull us back to a place where we're out. What is that, the DMV, what do they issue? A certificate of non-operation. I believe the majority of Christians have a certificate of non-operation.

I've been beat down, I've been back in my sin, I'm wallowing in my sin, I'm hooked to porn, I'm hooked to addiction, I'm not being used of God, my certificate of operation has been on me for many years.

Shayna, I wanna serve notice to you this morning. All it takes is a humble, broken heart, crying out to God and saying, oh God, have mercy upon me, a sinner. Have mercy upon me, a sinner. I give you all of my life, Lord, this is wrong, but Lord, I call upon you.

I call upon you to save me and set me free and redeem me. Now, you can't go back right into the sin tonight. There's a fight, there's a struggle. Has anyone ever said, I'm not gonna do that anymore? Does it come easily?

It's all I can do to stop eating chocolate. I'm telling you what, whew, like, mm-hmm. Just wake up at night, want chocolate. In the morning, want chocolate. I know that's a little thing. We all struggle with big things, too, but the little, I've noticed in life, it's the little foxes.

Small Compromises and the Little Foxes

It's the little things that get you back off track. The devil will tell the alcoholic, just have one. The opiate user, just have one prescription, just to take that back pain away. Just that one click of the mouse.

See, it's often the little choices. It's the little things. The small foxes ruin the vine the Bible talks about. And we're looking out for the big things, which are good, but watch out for the little subtleties because sin fascinates you before it assassinates.

It's the little things. You think the devil's just, I'm just gonna leave here and have a moral failure, or is it the little things? If I start to compromise, start to compromise here, start to, I don't have time to pray anymore.

I don't have time to be transparent. I don't have time for repentance. I don't have time, and these little choices begin to compromise. It's like the patty cake, come on, come on. The devil begins to just walk you, come on, and you get to this pit of despair and you wonder how you got there.

It started a long time ago. That's why you've got to eradicate it, sin at its root.