The Keys to the Kingdom (05/07/2017)

Hello, I'm Lee Michaels and I want to welcome you to our Park Meadows Church Services with Pastor David Mitchell.

But let's keep everybody in here because my great friend Myron Golden is going to preach today and he does know how to teach both the adult and the child at once and even bring out the child in all of us from time to time.

But if you're a visitor, I think even our visitors, most of you guys have heard

Brother Myron, a lot of you have, and so you've heard me introduce him, but we go way back.

We knew each other when we were both very, very young men, so we've known each other for a couple of months and Myron is a businessman preacher like I am, but he is in the word in such a way that whatever he brings to you today, he's going to bring things both old and new out of the word.

He's going to show you something you haven't seen before, I guarantee you that. But he was in Dallas doing a business conference and so we got the privilege of him driving down to preach for us today and I'm so happy about that.

Brother Myron, come on up here, we're going to give you all the time this morning that you need.

Usually I preach until around supper, so, alright. Good morning!

How are y 'all doing? Me too, me too. I'm really excited to be here.

I like to look at folks when I first stand up to preach so I can see everybody, so it makes me happy to see my friends.

It's good to see y 'all. Yeah, I'm really, really thankful for the opportunity to be here.

My wife couldn't make it this time, but I think we're going to be back at the end of the month, so maybe she'll, well

I know she's going to come with me, so maybe we'll stay a little longer. Ha ha. Know what I mean? Alright.

You know, it's amazing to me about the Bible that no matter how much you read it, no matter how much you study it, no matter how much you meditate on it, you can always be learning it, but you can never know it.

Amen? You know what I mean? Like, it's infinite. We're finite. It's infinite. Attempting to, like, get to the place where I know the

Bible so well, I don't have to do that anymore, right? That would be like attempting to put the Atlantic Ocean in a teaspoon, which would be more possible than us coming to the place where we actually know the

Bible. So, and I like to encourage people to always be learning, versus getting to the place where we think we know.

In fact, as I share with people around the world as I'm teaching them business or as I'm teaching them the

Bible, that the purpose of learning is not even knowing. That's not the purpose of learning.

The purpose of learning is mastery. And when I say mastery, I don't mean mastery to the point where, well

I've got it down now. That's not what I mean. But I mean mastery to the point, we can master a thing, but we can't master everything.

So there's always something else to master. I think when we get to the place where we think we know something, what happens is, it hinders us from learning anything more.

So I hope that, and you pray for me, I'll pray for you, that we'll all stay perpetually curious about the

Word of God. Amen? Wouldn't that be good? So, I'm going to read a couple of passages that we're familiar with, but one of them has had me perplexed for several, several decades.

And I'm not going to pretend that I understand it fully now, but I really think there's some stuff in here that we can examine and take our lives to a place that is just remarkable.

And usually I have a long introduction and a very short message. Today it's going to be kind of opposite.

I'm going to have a short introduction and a long message. So praise the Lord. Long always comes out.

Amen? Praise the Lord. So, I want to speak to you about the keys to the kingdom of heaven.

Isn't that a fascinating concept in the Bible? The concept of the kingdom of heaven is fascinating by itself.

The concept of the keys of the kingdom of heaven take it to a whole other level now, and I feel a long introduction coming on.

So let me start reading before I get myself in trouble.

In John chapter 8, verses 30 through 32, it says,

As he spake these words, many believed on him. Then said Jesus to those

Jews which believed on him, If, what was the word he said? Oh, if, okay.

If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed.

Which tells us that there's a possibility that people can believe on him and not continue in his word.

Well, that's kind of scary. Amen? And then it says,

And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.

Then understood, okay, now I'm going to go to a different passage. We're going to go to Matthew chapter 16. This is the one that has had me perplexed.

I'm still a little perplexed about it, but I think that the revelation that I have on it I think will be helpful for you because it's helpful for me.

Matthew chapter 16, beginning with verse 12 and down to verse 20, it says, Then understood they, talking about his disciples, how that he bade them not beware of the leaven of the bread, but of the doctrine of the

Pharisees and the Sadducees. And when Jesus came into the coast of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying,

Whom do men say that I, the Son of man, am? And they said, Some say thou art

John the Baptist, some Elias, others Jeremiah, or one of the prophets.

He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? Peter answered and said unto him,

Thou art the Christ, the Mashiach, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him,

Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my

Father which is in heaven. And I say unto thee that thou art

Peter. And upon this rock, and by the way, when he said upon this rock, he wasn't talking about upon the rock of Peter, okay, as the

Catholics would have us to believe. He said, And on this rock

I will build my church, my called out assembly.

And this is the part that was perplexing for me. And the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

Has anybody else ever been perplexed by this passage, or is it just me? Okay, there's three of us, praise the

Lord. And then he said, in verse 19,

And I will give unto thee the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loose in heaven.

And that was really confusing to me because I always felt like, I know it wasn't backwards, but I always felt like it was backwards.

Whatever you loose on earth would be loose in heaven. It would seem like what you loose in heaven would be loose on earth. It seems like it would start in heaven and then come down here.

But it says whatever you loose on earth will be loose in heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven.

Now, you're probably a lot smarter than me, but that made me dizzy. Like, I'm, what is he talking about?

Okay, so, and then it says, Then charged he his disciples that they should tell no man that he was

Jesus the Christ, or that he was Yeshua the Messiah. So, let's pray. Father, thank you for your word.

Thank you that it is truth. I pray that you would open all of our eyes as we study together your word, and teach us, teach us what these keys are.

Teach us how to use them. Teach us how to bind on earth what should be bound, and how to loose on earth what should be loosed.

And we thank you in advance for the work that you'll do in our lives in Jesus' name. Amen. All right.

So, really, a really interesting passage that he says that,

On this rock I'll build my church. So, this is, we're going to start here kind of in the middle of this whole thing.

Jesus, and let me kind of give you the background. Jesus had just gotten done rebuking the scribes and the

Pharisees. And he's going to rebuke them again later. And when he rebukes them later, he says, he says to them,

He says, you know, you make disciples of yourselves, and after you convert them, you make them two -fold more the child of hell than yourselves.

He says, you'll go, you'll travel across land and sea to make one proselyter, one convert.

And then he said, you make them two -fold more the child of hell. Really fascinating.

He told his disciples before he started saying, before he asked the question, Who do men say that I am?

He told his disciples, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. And they, the disciples are so like us.

They just didn't know what he was talking about. What does he mean by that? You know what, we forgot to bring bread.

He's probably talking about the fact we forgot to bring bread. You know what, we did forget to bring bread. Maybe he's rebuking us kind of for forgetting it.

And Jesus said, why do you reason among yourselves? I'm not talking about bread. I'm talking about the doctrine, the teaching of the

Pharisees. He said, Jesus was cautioning them about the doctrine, about false doctrine.

And the really interesting thing is, we have to be very, very intentional about where we get our doctrine.

The Bible says that in the last days, men shall keep teachers unto themselves. Have itchy ears.

It says in the last days, men shall give heed to, listen to what it says. It says, men shall give heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of demons.

All these people walking around, I'm like, well, I'm casting out demons. Well, first of all, you're probably not.

And second of all, the demon doesn't have to possess you to mess up your life.

The demons are going to oppress you with false doctrine. And we have to understand that even the

Apostle Paul said in 2 Corinthians chapter 11, he said, I fear lest by any means. The Apostle Paul said,

I'm afraid. Lest by any means that as the serpent beguile thee, the same way

Satan tricked Eve, so your minds, your what?

Mind should be corrupted from the simplicity that's in Christ. Satan operates by putting thoughts in our mind and making us think those thoughts are our thoughts.

We have to understand that all thoughts don't come from God and all thoughts don't come from you. And all thoughts don't come from your mom and your daddy and your brother.

Some thoughts come directly from the evil one. And we have to be able to recognize demonic doctrine so that we can resist it and rebuke it when it comes.

I told you

I felt a long introduction coming on. And then he's warning them about false doctrine.

And then he asked the question. Jesus wasn't asking the question, who do men say that I am?

Because he didn't know who men were saying that he was. When Jesus asked a question, he asked a question of the people that he was asking the question of to engage their mind, not to find out some new information.

See, if Jesus would have just said, I am the Christ, son of the living

God, they would have said, well, we know that already. So Jesus was getting their mind engaged by asking,

OK, who do men say that I am? What's my reputation in the marketplace? OK, now, who do you say that I am?

Well, I'm the Christ, the son of the living God. OK, now they're plugged in that.

And then he said, blessed are you, Simon Bar -Jonah, because flesh and blood has not revealed on him, because flesh and blood cannot reveal it unto you.

Flesh and blood cannot reveal to somebody who the Messiah is. Personality can't do it.

Charisma can't do it. IQ can't do it. Education can't do it.

There's only one way that someone can recognize who is Yeshua, the Mashiach, Jesus, the

Messiah, and that is if the Father reveals it to them. A few chapters earlier,

Jesus was teaching a multitude in parables. The disciples came to him and they said to him, why are you teaching in parables?

They were basically saying, don't you understand that we keep teaching in parables? Some of these people ain't going to get it.

Jesus said, I know that's why I'm teaching in parables. He said,

I'm teaching in parables, lest some hearing should hear and understand, should see and perceive, and should believe.

You mean he didn't want everybody to believe? No, no, no, no. He didn't want everybody to believe. He only wanted the children of the

Father to believe. He didn't want the children of Satan to believe. I mean, it's in the

Bible. I mean, a lot of people like to ignore it, but it's in the Bible. He told the story about the wheat and the chaff.

And he said, here's what he said. Myron didn't say this. He said, the chaff are the children of the wicked one.

Okay? So you have to understand, he's enlightening us.

And then he said, Peter said, thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And he said, on this rock,

I will build my church. What rock was he talking about? He was talking about the rock of the truth that he is the

Christ, the Son of the living God. Now, you have to understand, it's easy for us to see that Jesus is the

Messiah. Right? Why? Because we're looking back in time. In hindsight, it's 2020, but foresight's not quite that good.

You have to understand that they have been looking for the Messiah for centuries. And because he was going to come the first time and be crucified, and the second time and reign, they couldn't see the timeline.

So when the Messiah came, they were looking for somebody to come and relieve them from the

Roman oppression, from the governmental oppression of the day. And he said, blessed are you,

Simon, you recognize who I am. I am the Christ, the Mashiach, the Son of the living God. But flesh and blood hasn't revealed it unto you.

And then he said, on this rock, the rock of this truth, the truth that he is the

Mashiach, the Son of the living God, I'll build my church. I'll build my assembly of called out ones on the rock of this truth that I am the

Christ. I'm the one you've been waiting for. I'm the Mashiach, the Messiah, the one you've been waiting for.

I am he. I'm going to build my church on this rock of this truth. OK, now they're starting to get excited.

OK, they're starting to get they're starting to get worked up. And then he said, I give unto you.

Oh, and he said, the gates of hell will not prevail against it. The gates of hell won't prevail against the church. I've heard so many sermons on this that are so out in left field, left field for you is that way, left field for me is that way.

But it's still left field. And it says the gates of hell.

Now, before we can identify, I mean, if Jesus said that the gates of hell won't prevail against the church, would it not be good for us to understand what those gates are?

Number one, what those gates are. Number two, where those gates are. Whether the gates of hell, so they're in hell.

OK, I would recommend that we go a little bit farther than that. So what are the gates of hell?

OK, so let's ask the question. What is the purpose of a gate? Is that a good question? A gate can only do two things, right?

It can either it can either restrain something inside or it can restrict something outside.

Those only two things the gates can do. So when we see that Jesus is going to build a church and the gates of hell will prevail against the church.

We have what's being restrained by the gates of hell and what's being what restricted by the gates of hell.

Can I go with this? And I'm telling you,

I have thought about this for a couple of decades because I am like, I'm so confused.

And then he said, I give unto thee the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Now, that's fascinating. He talks about gates.

And he starts talking about keys. But the reason I'm confused and maybe you've been confused as well, at least three of us.

Is because the gates are the gates of hell. But the keys are the keys to the kingdom of heaven.

If the gate, I don't know. It would seem like if the gates are the gates of hell, then it would seem like the keys would need to be the keys to the gates of hell.

I don't know. That's how we usually take the keys, right? This key is for that door. That key is for this door. This key is for that car.

Are y 'all with me? Okay, but it seems like what he's saying seems like what he's saying is that the keys to the kingdom of heaven are unlocking the gates of hell.

That's what it seems like. It's saying to me now. I don't think I'm reading anything. I don't like to read stuff into the Bible.

I don't like to read stuff into it. I like to read stuff out of it. It works better that way. But it seems like he's saying

I'm going to give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. And then he said something.

Something really amazing. He said, whatever you lock up on earth. Is going to be what?

Locked up in heaven. And then he said, whatever you unlock on earth is going to be unlocked where?

In heaven. Intriguing. I mean, is that intriguing to you?

Can y 'all see where I'm a little confused still, but it looks like we might be getting somewhere.

So then I have to ask the question. What are these keys?

Right? I mean, that is the question. We've already identified one of the questions about the gates, what the gates are.

They're restricting access from something. And they're restraining something on the inside.

So we've established that. What we haven't established yet about the gates is where they are.

But we will establish that, I do believe. Where are these gates? We'll talk about that in a minute.

But then what are the keys? I believe that the keys to the kingdom of heaven are the keys. Why do

I believe the truth? Are the keys to the kingdom of heaven?

Because Jesus said in John 8, 30 through 32, as he spake these words, many believed on him.

They had something in common with Peter, didn't they? They recognized him as the Mashiach, the son of the living God. So how did they know that he was the

Mashiach, the son of the living God? Who revealed it to them? The father revealed it to them. The father revealed to them that truth, that he was the

Mashiach, the son of the living God. So when they believed on him, here's what he said, here's what I want you to do.

He said, under these Jews that which believed on him, if you continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed.

Disciples meaning pupils, students, ones who are disciplined after me. If you continue in my word, because the word is the truth.

Okay, so I've got to establish something else really quickly. There's a difference between what's true and what's truth.

One of the problems that the world has today, why there's such a lack of discernment, and so many people have been given over to a reprobate mind, is because people do not recognize that there's a difference between what's true and what's truth.

And here's what you have to remember about true and truth. What's true is dynamic, or can be dynamic, but what's truth is static.

So static means it does not change. Truth does not change. But what's true can change. So you say, well how can what's true change?

Okay, for instance, when we were born, we were all babies. That was true, but it wasn't true.

Why wasn't it true? Because it could change. We became children, and then we became teenagers, and then we became adults.

Right? So what's true can change. I was born in Tampa.

That was true. But I grew up in Pennsylvania, so I no longer lived in Tampa. So what's true can change. But what's truth can't change.

And see, people, our world is so confused right now because they are constantly seeking to change the truth.

They're attempting to make the truth dynamic. The truth doesn't have to be relevant. You know, it's amazing to me that there's so many churches out there are seeking to build big congregations by being relevant.

Jesus never attempted to be relevant. All he did was tell the truth. And when he told the truth, he told it in an authoritative way so that there was no argument.

He said, here's what they said about Jesus. He speaks as one having authority, not as a scribe and pharisee.

The authority that he had was the authority of the truth. And even when you understand the word truth, the word truth in English is just, well, it's truth.

It's just a word, right? But in Hebrew, what's the word truth? It's amet. Aleph -mem -tam.

Aleph is the first letter in the Hebrew alphabet, and it's God's letter. Like aleph.

In fact, in Israel, a general is called an aleph. He's the general.

He's in charge. He's the strong one. So aleph, when you see an aleph in scripture, it always represents

God. Another reason it represents God is because an aleph is written with two yids and a bab.

A yid is a hand. So a bab is a hook or a nail. And so there's a slanted bab, and then there's a yid and another yid.

So there's two hands. There's a hand above, and there's a hand beneath, and there's a bab or a nail or a hook that connects them together.

We know who that is, don't we? That's Yeshua, the Mashiach, the son of the living God. Same one. And what's really interesting about the aleph is

God has a lot of numbers in scripture as well. So I figured I might as well throw this in there because this is really helpful to see.

There are no isolated dots in the scripture. It all has to make sense together.

Or if some part of it doesn't make sense when you take it out, then you took it out the wrong way. Right? Or when you look at it by itself, if it doesn't make sense in conjunction with everything else that's in there, then you have misinterpreted it.

Or I have misinterpreted it. Right? It has to make sense fully connected together all the way through. So what's really interesting is the number 1 is one of the numbers for God, but the number 3 is also one of the numbers for God.

But the number 26 is also one of the numbers for God. You say, 26? How is 26 a number for God? Because an aleph, even though it's two yids and above and it's number 1, a yid's number is 10.

So two yids, that's 10 and 10 is 20. And above is 6, that's 26. But if you take the name that the

Hebrews don't pronounce, yid -hay -buv -hay, you take that name and you add the numbers of those letters together, that also comes out to be 26.

Yid, that's a hand. Hay, behold. Vuv, that's a nail. Hay, behold. So the name yid -hay -buv -hay is the hand, behold, the nail, behold.

Or if you read it backward, behold the nail, behold the hand. Who's that talking about? That's talking about Yeshua. The Mashiach, the son of the living

God. Now, I'm good on time, right?

So some people say, well, I don't understand why the Jews don't get it. I understand. One of the reasons Jews don't get it is because of Christians.

Okay, David will remember. Me and David have a lot of conversations and I ask him a lot of stuff and he teaches me a lot of stuff. So that's like a lot of stuff that I know

I learned from him. And I'm not even exaggerating when I say that. I mean, I really mean that.

So I'm not even being humorous at all. So I'll come to David and I'll say, well, what about this?

So I don't know if you remember this conversation we had a couple of months ago. And I said, so I don't get it. Like how come when we trace

Christianity, how come we always go back to Catholicism? Remember we had that conversation? But Christianity, like Jesus wasn't a

Catholic. So what's the deal? He was a Jew. Why don't we go back to the apostles? Anyway, I told another conversation that we had.

Anyway, one of the reasons we have so much Catholicism in the church.

Catholicism. Is that a word? I know catechism is a word, but Catholicism. I just made it up. Somebody's got to make up the word.

Y 'all know what I mean. So if you look at modern day Christianity, part of the challenge and part of the confusion for even people in the church is if you look at the father of modern day

Christianity, it would be like Catholicism. It's where most Christian churches came out as Protestants, right? And if you look at the grandfather of the church, that would be

Catholicism. If you look at the great grandfather, it would be like Greek mythology. That's why the

Catholics have all these different gods and idols and saint this and saint that and Mary's the mother of God and all this other weird stuff.

Because it's a form of polytheistic idolatry.

And so when the Jews look at Christians, they look at us and say, but y 'all believe in all these different gods, right?

And we believe in one God, right? So a lot of times Christians get upset because the

Jews can't see it and it's in the Hebrew language. Well, part of the reason they can't get is because because we help them not get it, right?

Our testimonies not testify. See, God, the reason God grafted in the Gentiles was to provoke the

Jews to jealousy, but we got to give them something to be jealous of. Can I get a witness up in here? Anyway, that was a sidetrack, but it was a good track.

Okay, get back on track, man. So the keys are the keys of what?

True. Now, I said that truth is a man. All of them. Todd office. The first letter of the

Hebrew alphabet. Men is the middle letter. Thomas, the last letter office. God, like Tom.

I mean, man is actually what it means. Water, but the power of water, like a force of the ocean.

It's like powerful. And then time would be across our covenant, right? So it's really interesting that the truth, the picture of truth is all of men.

God is this powerful force of the ocean. He's our covenant. When we think of the covenant in that way, we think of the fact that God swore by his own existence to bless those that bless

Abram and protect and curse those that curse Abram. It just puts it in a whole new light, right? Especially when you think of the fact that what?

What happened? You remember what happened when the children of Israel came out of Egypt? What happened? They went across the Red Sea, got part of the ocean because he's more powerful than the ocean.

And then the Egyptians tried to follow him. And what God do? He swallowed him up and drowned him in that same force. So anyway,

I don't mean to chase as many rabbits as I do.

But so amet means truth. But if you take Allah, you try to get God and take him away from the truth, the

Allah, you take the Allah away from the amet. Then all you have left is met. What is met in Hebrew?

The word met in Hebrew is the word for death. When you attempt to remove God from the truth, all you have left is death.

So he said, I give unto you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. What are the keys to the kingdom of heaven? The keys of truth.

That is why we must be diligent students of the word of God. Because whenever we find the truth about an area of our lives, it gives us the ability to unlock that area of bondage.

So let's answer the question. Where are the gates of hell? Is that a good question? I believe that the gates of hell exist on the strongholds and a stronghold is a fortress.

I believe that the gates of hell are on the strongholds that are in our minds. Gates of hell are on the strongholds within our minds.

And by the way, I will say that I might be wrong about this, but I haven't found myself to be wrong. And I'm still studying, but I haven't found myself to be wrong.

And I'm going to share some verses with you on that as well. The gates of hell are on the strongholds within our minds. It makes the passage make total sense now.

The scripture tells us, by the way, a stronghold is a fortress around a lie. So we've been taught a false doctrine about something, right?

And what do we do? Because we maybe have practiced that doctrine through tradition over years, we build a wall of protection around it and we won't let the truth penetrate.

That's called a stronghold. What does the Bible tell us about strongholds in 2 Corinthians chapter 11?

It says, in fact, I'm going to read it to you because I don't want to miss any of the verses. I'm going to read it to you. I could quote it, but I'd probably leave some of it out.

And I don't want to leave any of it out because this is so, so powerful. This is powerful for us to live, not just powerful for us to have to know about, right?

It says in 2 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 3, for though we walk in the flesh, that means we live in a fleshly body, we do not war, what?

After the flesh. So there's one clue right there that it's in our mind. We do not war after the flesh.

The battleground of spiritual warfare is in the mind. We do not war after the flesh.

For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, they're not fleshly, but they are what?

Mighty through who? God to the pulling down of what? Strongholds.

Casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity, oh, there's that word again.

Every what? Thought to the obedience of Christ. But what does it say right after that?

It says having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience when?

When your obedience is fulfilled. I give unto thee the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.

Every Sunday when David Mitchell is preaching the gospel, here's what he's doing. He's taking one of the keys to the kingdom of heaven and he's unlocking the gates of hell that are protecting the lies in your minds so that the lie can be released, the walls can be cast out, and now the truth can penetrate.

I give unto you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. I mean,

I'm sorry. On this rock I'll build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. And I give unto you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth.

So if you lock up the truth, in other words, if you do not use the keys to the kingdom of heaven and unlock the gates of hell that are in people's minds, then they're going to be stuck right there where they are in that lie.

What did Jesus tell them right after he said, I give unto you the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven.

Then he said, he charged them that they should tell no man that he's the Christ. Oh, isn't that interesting?

Here's what he said. Don't use these keys yet. I've not gone to the cross. I've not resurrected. Don't use these keys yet.

He says, I give unto you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.

And there's so much in here. I give unto you,

I want to make sure I read it here because I don't want to leave anything out. I give unto you the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth will be bound in heaven.

In other words, whatever you bind on earth, the truth that you lock up on earth, because you will not teach it.

Remember after Peter denied the Lord? And then Jesus came back. No, no, no, no.

After Peter denied the Lord, he asked Peter what? Peter, lovest thou me? What did Peter say? Do you agape me?

Thou knowest that I phileo thee. Agape, you know that I phileo thee. Okay, so he asked him that question three times. And here's what he said.

Every time he asked him that, he said, feed my sheep. What's that talking about? Go use the keys that I gave you to the kingdom of heaven and unlock.

Do you understand that our world, our entire world lives in a paradigm of lies?

And the only hope that our children have, even growing up in a semi -safe world, is if we do our job.

I heard a guy speak yesterday that was phenomenal. He's a Christian filmmaker. And he said,

Hollywood is great at taking lies and making them seem true. And Christianity is great at taking the truth and making it seem like it's fake.

Wow, that is so powerful. We live like we have no power. Like we are on the victim side and the

Bible says we're on the victory side. It's not that we're going to win. You do understand that we are not going to win.

You do understand that, right? We are not going to win. We have already won. It's already a done deal.

Okay. So, he said, if you lock it up on earth, the truth that you do not release on earth will still be locked in heaven.

Because that's where the truth originates. The truth that you release on earth, when you use the truth to unwindage in the lives of the people in your family, and the people in your community, and the people at your job, what happens is,

I'm going to tell you something. I have had the privilege of witnessing the people in all kinds of different circumstances.

And when I first got saved, I got saved in a church that had this practice called soul winning. Which is not,

I like using Bible terms. So, the term soul winning is in the Bible. It's in the

Bible. But it's not used in context of witnessing to somebody. It's used in the context of making friends.

When the Bible says, he that winneth souls is wise, it's not talking about going out and knocking on somebody's door and telling them about Jesus. It's in the book of Proverbs for crying out loud.

It's the only time it's used. It's talking about making friends. He that hath friends must show himself friendly. He that winneth souls is wise.

You win friends, you're wise. Even the story of the unjust steward, what did he do? When he lost his position, he went out and made friends of the unrighteous man.

And his boss commended him because he had wisdom, the wisdom that was greater than the wisdom of the children of life.

So, I believe in witnessing the people. I don't believe in witnessing the people because I get people saved or because I lead people to, or because I win people to the

Lord. I believe in witnessing the people because God told me to. The outcome is his responsibility.

The activity is my responsibility. Do y 'all see the difference? And so what happens is we get so caught up in the activity that we think that the outcome and the activity are the same.

They're not. And I was sharing with people that in order to lead people to the

Lord, you don't always have to lead with the Lord. Did y 'all pick up what

I just put down? Yes. In fact, the Lord himself did not always lead with the

Lord. You know what he led with? He led with healing the sick. He led with feeding the hungry. He led by giving them, showing them an example of love and being an example of something that they should desire.

We proclaim this great truth of the gospel while we live like it's not real. I'm going to tell you something.

The life that we live in Christ should cause people to desire what we have. Just ain't looking at us like, man, you know what

I want? I don't know what's up. That dude's different. I want some of that. That sister over there,

I don't know what she got going on, but I want some of that. We understand.

I really believe. I could talk to you. In fact, I'm going to. We see, first of all, recognition of the keys to the kingdom of heaven.

What is the recognition? Well, the keys are the truth. What are the applications? The applications of the truth are, number one, proclaim the truth, and number two, practice the truth.

Because proclamation of the truth without practicing the truth looks like a lie.

You know why? Because it is a lie. Because if you believed it was true, you'd live like it was true. When you really believe something, you can't help but do something about it.

You ain't going to believe your house is on fire and say, well, I'd go just take a nap. Don't you smell that smoke?

Yeah, but I'm sleepy right now. I'll put it out when I wake up. Good luck with that. So the recognition of the truth is we have to recognize truth, and that is why it is a lifetime study to study the word of God.

Because when we study the word of God, God gives us revelation of the truth that we can apply to our life.

Do you understand? It's so amazing to me, because I've always wondered this, and I just found the answer since I started studying

Hebrew. I've always wondered, why do Christians act like the Bible is a book of magic? And when

I read it, I see a book of practice. Like, go do this. Here's what the Bible says. The Bible says, go do this to make your life better.

Christians believe, I'll read this and God will make my life better. Amen. Okay, I'll move on.

All right. So we see the recognition of the truth. We see the application of the truth. The last thing I want to talk to you about is this, the continuation of the truth.

Do you remember what he said to the Jews that believed on him in John 8, John chapter 8?

And Jesus said unto those Jews that believed on him, if ye, what, continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed.

And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. When you know the truth, see, when you know the truth, you show the truth.

Because you live it. I mean, if you really believe it's true, you're going to do something about it.

And when you do something about it, the thing that you do about it produces a totally different outcome than when you were living a lie, than that life produces.

Amen. So the question then becomes, how do

I continue in the truth? Is that a good question? And the answer is, as quickly as I possibly can, the answer is, that doesn't mean quick.

That just means as quickly as I possibly can. Okay, as quickly as I possibly can. The answer is faith.

And you have to understand what faith, see, faith originates with he who is faithful.

When we recognize his faithfulness, his faithfulness gives us faith. And the faith that his faithfulness gives us causes us to be faithful.

Do y 'all see that? Faithfulness, faith, faithfulness. Are y 'all with me?

So, when we want to understand faith, where do we have to go? If we want to understand the anatomy of faith, where do we have to go in the scripture?

Where do we go in the scripture to understand the anatomy of faith? What faith is and how faith operates? Where do we have to go? We have to go to what book?

What is it? Hebrews chapter 11. Hebrews chapter 11 says, verse 1, now faith is the what?

Substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Now, the unfortunate part about that verse is it is so poetically beautiful that we can get lost in the poetry and never even see the application.

I mean, that sounds so, I mean, listen to how that sounds. Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

That's so beautiful. Like when we look at the beauty of it, and then we go, well, that's nice.

And then we go about our business and have dinner. But I want you to, let's break the pieces apart.

Here's what it says. The first word is what? Now. Which tells us that faith is something that we can only have when we allow ourself to enter a now that requires that we have faith.

Amen. Okay, did y 'all pick it up? Did I say that too fast? Hey, hey.

Faith, like Bible faith, is something we can only have when we allow ourselves to enter a now that requires that we have faith.

Let me show you what now faith looks like. Now faith looks like a man who is 480 years old and has never seen a raindrop.

Get out and says, hey, no. I want you to go build an ark, big one.

How big do you want it? Really big. Okay, you want to go build it down by the water? No, no, just go out in the forest and build it.

You want me to build a big boat in the forest? You don't need a trailer, Noah. Just go build the ark.

And Noah went out in the woods and took 120 years of his life with his three sons and built an ark because it was going to rain.

And the Bible says he was a preacher of righteousness. He preached to people. It's going to rain.

It's going to rain. You better get ready. Bear this in mind. God showed

Noah the rainbow sign. He said it won't be water. That's a song.

Anyway, he says it's going to rain. They said, Noah, what's rain? He said water is going to fall from the sky. You're building this big old monstrosity of a building, because that's what it looked like to them, in the wilderness, because water is going to fall from the sky.

You are nuts. But God's faithfulness to Noah gave

Noah enough now faith to work on that ark and continue for how long? 120 years.

I've never worked on anything for 120 years. Sounds kind of tiring to me.

I don't know. Faithfulness of God caused us to have faith, now faith.

But he entered into the now that required that he had faith. See, now faith gave David the ability to run towards the giant that everybody else was running from.

It gave him the ability to have now faith. Do you understand that every time you come to a now that requires that you have faith, if you don't allow yourself to receive that faith from God and enter into that situation, you go back and the timer hits reset.

You've got to start all over again. So you continue by faith.

Now faith is the substance. The prefix sub means under. So now faith, what kind of faith?

Now faith. It's something that's under you, substance. Stance means to stand upon.

So now faith is something firm under me that I can stand on. Substance of things.

Things means in the Greek, here's what it means. It means things. What kind of things?

All kinds of things. And I know that sounds funny, but when you think about faith, faith is spiritual.

It's ethereal. It's invisible. But things are material. They're physical.

I'm not going to say they're real because reality is invisible. Physicality is nothing more than the manifestation of reality.

We are not more real than God. So invisibility is where reality exists and physicality is where reality manifests itself so we can experience it.

I'll prove that to you in a minute since some of y 'all are kind of like, where is this thing coming from? Tampa, Florida.

Okay. Now faith is something under me, the substance of things.

Hope for the word hope. Does it mean a wish, a wish, a wish, a wish, a hope, hope, hope, hope, hope, hope? I'm just waiting on the Lord. No, that's not what the word hope means.

The word hope means a well -founded, well -grounded expectation for the future. The word hope is expectation.

Things hope for. And then it says a really amazing word. Here's what it says. The next word is the word evidence. What's the word evidence mean?

Proof of things not seen. Here's what it says. Now faith. What kind of faith?

Talk to me, church. What kind of faith? Now faith is where I stand on the things

I expect while I prove the things I cannot see.

Oh, that's what faith is. That's what faith is. And then the scripture says for by it, the elders obtained a good report.

Hey, everybody who's ever obtained a good report has obtained a good report by faith. By seeing through the curtain that separates the physical from the invisible and seeing the invisible as if it were physical.

I know that's true because the same passage tells us that. What does the next verse say? It says for by it, that is by faith, we understand.

Oh, well, there's a revelation. By faith, we understand. It did not say by understanding, we have faith.

People say as soon as I understand, I believe. It doesn't work that way. You got it out of order. Here's how it works. When you believe, that's when you can begin to understand.

By faith, we understand that the world, it didn't say the world, it said world. It's plural. We're framed by the word of God.

What are these worlds? Well, it tells us in the same verse. So the things which are seen, that's one world, are not made of things which do appear, that's the other world.

By faith, we understand that the worlds, these parallel worlds, the invisible and the physical, running on parallel tracks, were framed by the word of God, by the

Aleph -Tah, by the Aleph -Beth, by the word. In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was

God, and the saying was in the beginning of God. It was framed. The framework of the universe is the word of God. And then we see our best example of continuity.

And then he goes on to give us example after example after example after example after example after example. I'm not going to read all the examples to you.

We would be here all day then. But here's what it tells us. And here's what it tells us in Hebrews chapter 11.

It tells us about some of the people who lived in faith and died having received the promises.

It tells us about some of the people who lived in faith and died as martyrs and did not see the promises. It tells us about people who were examples and because of it accomplished great things.

And then it tells us about people who were examples of faith and they died and it didn't seem like they accomplished anything at all from the outside looking in.

You go read the chapter. Some were sewn in sheepskins and goatskins and thrown to the lions for entertainment, for pagans.

And a lot of people say, well, is this all I was living for? But then it comes over to one of the most misunderstood passages in the

Scripture. I'm almost done. I'm circling the field. You can put your seat back up and your tray table up and get ready for landing because we stole away all your...

Anyway, you got it. So, Hebrews chapter 12. One of the most misunderstood passages in Scripture.

Here's what it tells us in Hebrews chapter 12, verse 1. It says, wherefore seeing we are also compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses.

Now, I know that people say that that means there are all the people gone because they're up in heaven witnessing us.

They may be, they may not be, I don't know, but that's not what this is saying. It's not telling us they are witnessing us.

It's telling us their testimony is witnessing to us. Witnessing to us about what? About the benefits of having faith.

Wherefore seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses of people who have lived lives of faith. Let us lay aside every weight, every burden.

Let's put it aside. Why? Because we have a race to run. And let us run with patience. The word patience means persistent, consistent endurance.

Let's run with patience the race that is set before us. My race is not John's race.

John's race is not David's race. David's race is not Aharon's race. We all have our race, the race that is set before us.

Let us run with race, the race that is set before us. Let us run with patience the race that is set before us. And then it says, let us lay aside every weight and the sin.

I forgot about that part. The sin. What is the sin that does so easily beset us? There's only one sin that does so easily beset us.

What is it? It's a sin of, what is it? Unbelief. The sin of doubt. The sin of anxiety.

The sin of doubt, unbelief, anxiety. You can call it whatever you want to. Same thing, different words. That's the sin that stops us.

The word besets us means stops us. And here's what it says. But how do I do that? How do I put aside the weight?

How do I put aside the trial? How do I put aside this difficulty and then run? He tells us right here.

You look unto Jesus. It's not talking about going outside and going like this. It's not what it's talking about.

It says looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. It's saying look at Jesus as our example. He is the perfect example of endurance through trial and difficulty.

Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. Here's how he did it. Watch this now. Who for the joy that was set, where?

Before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down on the right hand of the throne of God.

Here's how we continue. We continue like Jesus told those

Jews in John chapter 8. Here's how we continue in his word. We set the joy before us.

The joy of the outcome that God has promised. We set the joy of that outcome before us. Even though it looks like that's not a possibility.

Even though it looks like the promise that God gave us doesn't have a possibility of coming to pass. We set the joy of that outcome before us.

Because Satan wants to distract us with an outcome and deceive us into believing it's going to be a different outcome.

And when we focus on that, we begin to have anxiety, which is what Jesus tells us not to have. And here's what scripture is teaching us.

It's teaching us if we don't replace the anxious apprehension of the outcome that's undesirable with a joyful anticipation of the outcome that is desirable, we're going to quit.

We're going to give up. Because we're focused on the wrong thing. That's what it says.

Look under Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. Who for the joy that was set before him, what did he do? He endured the cross, despising the shame, and then what happened?

He sat down on the right hand of the throne of God. The very thing that gave him joy is the thing that he experienced in the end, regardless of what he had to go through to get there.

How do I know that's telling us that that's our example? Because of the next verse. Here's what it says. For consider him that endured such a contradiction of sinners against himself.

Why? Lest ye be wearied and faint. Where? In your minds. This Bible is so full!

What is the greatest joy that we can set before us? What is the greatest joy that we can set before us?

It tells us in Philippians chapter 4. Rejoice in the Lord always. By the way, do you realize as a follower of Christ you are supposed to live in a state of perpetual joy?

Joyfulness. Joyfulness doesn't mean I'm happy! Just happy! So happy! Joyfulness is so much bigger than that.

How do we live in a state of perpetual joy? Rejoice. You talk about redundancy. Rejoice. Re means to do again.

In the Lord always. Again, have joy in the Lord always. And again, I say, rejoice.

Again, have joy. What? Hey, he said, if y 'all don't get it after that,

I can't help you. Right? But what does the next verse tell us? What does the next verse tell us?

It says, let your moderation. What does moderation mean? What does moderation mean?

Self -control. Let your moderation be known unto all men. And then it says, for the

Lord is at hand. Now, I used to think, well, what does self -control have to do with being joyful? Here's what it has to do with being joyful. You don't use your self -control to be joyful.

You use your self -control to be mindful of the Lord who is always at hand. And if he's always at hand, that means he's always present.

And if he's always present, in his presence is what? Fullness of joy. The way that we maintain perpetual joyfulness so that we can endure the difficulties of the cross that we have to bear is by constantly using our self -control to remind ourselves that no matter what we're going through, the

Lord is with us. And then what happens?

The peace of God which passes all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds by Christ Jesus. I give unto you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.

Whatsoever thou bind on earth shall be bound in heaven. Whatsoever thou loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. And if you continue in my words, you'll be my disciples indeed.

And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. Thank you,

Father. Hallelujah, Father, for your word, for the truth, for the light, for the bread, for the water.

Thank you for the keys that unlock the strongholds that have been keeping us in bondage in our own minds.

And we thank you that we can be perpetually joyful because we can be willfully aware of the presence of your

Son. We thank you for the work that your word is going to do for us in our lives, in our families, in our businesses, in our jobs, in our schools, in our neighborhoods.

We thank you in advance for the work that your word does in this world, in our lives, in this church.

In the name of Yeshua. Brother David? Thanks again for joining us at Park Meadows.