Facing a Moment of Bitter Division — Carter Conlon

Facing a Moment of Bitter Division

Psalm 17, please, if you will. Psalm 17. I have a message the Lord's put on my heart called Facing a Moment of Bitter Division. Facing a Moment of Bitter Division. Father, I thank you, God, with all my heart.

I thank you for your presence here. I thank you for the strength that you give to us as we make the choice to live for you. I thank you for the calling that you've placed on all of us to be a city set upon a hill that cannot be hidden.

You told us that we are the light of the world. And so, Lord, we've been asking you to remove from us anything that hinders the brightness of that testimony. God Almighty, give me the grace to speak this today.

Overshadow my frailty. Help me to hide behind the cross. Lord Jesus Christ, speak to every heart. Speak to my heart, to the hearts of your people. This is a perilous and dark moment in history. But, Lord, you promised to have a testimony that is burning bright and alive and giving glory to your name.

So, God, we thank you for this with all of our heart in Jesus' name. Psalm 17, beginning at verse 1. It's a Psalm of King David. Hear a just cause, O Lord. Attend to my cry. Give ear to my prayer, which is not from deceitful lips.

Let my vindication come from your presence. Let your eyes look on the things that are upright. You've tested my heart. You have visited me in the night. You have tried me and found nothing. I have purposed that my mouth shall not transgress.

Concerning the works of men, by the word of your lips, I have kept away from the paths of the destroyer. Uphold my steps in your paths that my footsteps may not slip. I have called upon you, for you will hear me, O God.

Incline your ear to me and hear my speech. Show your marvelous loving kindness by your right hand, O you who save those who trust in you from those who rise up against them. Keep me as the apple of your eye.

Hide me under the shadow of your wings from the wicked who oppress me and from my deadly enemies who surround me. They have closed up their fat hearts. With their mouths, they speak proudly. They have now surrounded us in our steps.

They have set their eyes crunching down to the earth as a lion is eager to tear his prey and as a young lion lurking in secret places. Arise, O Lord. Confront him. Cast him down. Deliver my life from the wicked with your sword.

With your hand from men, O Lord, from men of this world who have their portion in this life and whose belly you fill with your hidden treasure. They are satisfied with children and leave the rest of their possession to their babes.

As for me, I will see your face in righteousness. I shall be satisfied when I awake in your likeness.". A phenomenal psalm from King David. There's no historical account of what were the circumstances actually when he wrote this, but most who study it tend to agree that it's most likely at the point in the kingdom of Israel where Saul has completely backslidden.

He's a totally secular leader now, even turning to spiritism. He's leading the nation away from God. Then you have King David who bears in himself the touch of heaven. He is the anointed of God to lead that nation at that particular time.

David's Speech in a Moment of Bitter Division

There's a battle raging now in this society between the two. It would appear that Saul has the upper hand and his armies, and it would also look in the natural like David is on the losing end of this struggle that's going on, this moment of bitter division.

David is concerned because all around him is such wicked speech. It's everywhere. It's permeating the air. Speech about vengeance, thoughts about murder, all kinds of things are going on at that particular time.

No shortage of it. Even the distressed in debt and discontent that came to him when he was hidden away from King Saul and his army, even they were advocating harm to the leader of Israel at that time.

David begins to cry out and says, God, would you protect me? Would you protect me and keep me from the paths of the destroyer? I have purposed that my mouth shall not transgress. God, I want my speech to be clean.

I want the words that I say to be right in your sight. David goes on and says, you've examined me every night and found nothing. In other words, before I go to bed at night, I trust God's Holy Spirit to do an inventory of my life that day.

Have my words been seasoned with grace? Have they produced healing? Have they created thirst for God? Have I spoken truth? Have I stayed away from the pathway of the one who comes to steal, kill, and destroy?

God, your touch is on me. I'm asking you to protect me. Proverbs 18, 21 says, death and life are in the power of the tongue and those who love it will eat its fruit. In other words, we can't escape the power of our own words.

Sometimes people think that they can be free to speak whatever they want and there will be no consequence to it. But don't forget, the Bible says, be not deceived. Whatever a man sows, he's going to reap.

Whatever you're sowing as you go through your day, you're going to reap that in your own life. You're going to reap it. God will not be mocked. That's what the scripture begins with. Whatever you sow, you're going to reap.

And some will reap it now, here in time, and others will reap it in eternity. Listen to what Jesus said in Matthew chapter 12. Just let me read it to you. Verses 35 to 37. A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth evil things.

But I say to you that for every idle word that men may speak, they will give an account of it in the day of judgment. Every word is recorded. Did you know that? You will stand before God one day and give an account, give an account of all your speech in public, in private, when you thought no one was listening.

For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned. Proverbs 22 11. This is a beautiful verse that I love. I wrote it out one time when I was a young pastor in Canada and put it on my desk.

He who loves purity of heart and has grace on his lips, the king will be his friend. I love that particular proverb, 22 11. Unity with God and friendship with the godly had always been the source of David's strength.

He loved righteousness. He hated wickedness. He stood on the side of truth, and because of it, he had known an empowerment of the spirit of God, and he knew that God had called him to something deeper than what people around him were discussing and trying to get into his spirit.

He says, you've tasted my heart. You visited me in the night. You've tried me and found nothing. I have purposed that my mouth shall not transgress. God, I want my speech to be right. That has to be the cry of every true believer in Christ in this generation in particular, because there's such evil abounding in people's speech.

Now you and I must not be partakers of it. We have to ask God for the grace, Lord God, almighty, help me to represent your kingdom, a kingdom of forgiveness, a kingdom of reconciliation, a kingdom of salvation.

God, that's my mission on the earth. Do not let my mouth represent any other kingdom. David said, concerning the works of men, by the word of your lips, I have kept from the pass of the destroyer. I have loved your word.

I hear what you're speaking to me, and it's by the things that you have spoken to my heart. I have not gone down the path that this society seems to have no power to resist. Uphold my steps in your path that my footsteps may not slip.

God almighty, help me. Has to be the cry of every believer in Christ now. Oh God, help me. God, help me. I don't even want the spirit of the news agencies getting into my spirit. Oh God, help me. God, help your people.

The Church's Unity Amid Social Hatred

God, help your church. Lord Jesus Christ, don't let that wicked spirit get ahold of us. Oh God, may we not be found as part of it in this generation. All around David were unjust accusations. Murmuring was in the air.

Talk of vengeance was abounding. It was everywhere. Brother was divided against brother, family against family, and former friend against friend. The social climate was like quicksand, and David knew that to venture into it without divine protection was to be swallowed up by it.

I can't tell you how many times I've stood in this pulpit in the last 10 years, warning you that a day of such bitter division was coming to this nation, that if you were not grounded in the word of God, if your value system was not God's value system, there you would have no power to stand against it.

Like a river, it would sweep you along in its channel to places you never thought you were going to be capable of going. Jesus himself warned about the spirit that would be in this world in the last day, in Matthew 24, verses 10 and 12.

Many will be offended and will betray one another and hate one another. And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold. The love of truth will grow cold. The love of the work of God will grow cold.

The love of humanity will grow cold. And sad to say, even the love that we are supposed to have for one another in the body of Christ will also begin to grow cold in some people's hearts. What a tragedy that will be because our strength, the glory of God, the testimony of God is found in unity.

When brethren dwell together in unity, it's like the oil that was poured upon the head of Aaron, the priest down to the skirts of his garment. In other words, the power of God, that ability to be set apart for God, the ability to stand and see the power of God emanate from your life comes when you and I are walking in unity with God and with one another as the body of Jesus Christ.

Like the dew upon the mountains, when the sun hits the snow on the highest peak of a mountain and it begins to melt and supplies moisture to everything around its base. When you and I are walking together in unity as the body of Jesus Christ, as the body of Christ on the earth, when we're walking together in unity, there's a river of life that flows from us.

And it gives drink to those that are thirsty in our streets and in our homes and in our society. Just as Joseph's father, Israel gave him a coat of many colors. So to God, the father gave his son, Jesus, a body.

I believe that Joseph's coat was a type of Christ in his church. God gave his son, Jesus, a church of many colors. Thank God for that coat of many colors. Revelation chapter seven and verse nine tells us that one day, a great multitude, which no one could number of all nations, tribes, people, and tongues are standing before the throne together, worshiping God, crying out among the created beings of heaven.

Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts. Heaven and earth are filled with his glory. And just as Joseph did, Jesus had to suffer betrayal. He was sold out for coins. He was falsely accused and shut up and forgotten.

Joseph shut up and forgotten in prison and Jesus Christ shut up and forgotten in a tomb with a stone rolled in front of it. But thank God he did it all for us. Everything that Christ went through was that we may be forgiven and we may find ourselves in a place where all we need to glorify his name is given to us, especially in moments like this.

Oh, thank God. I hope you feel in your heart what I'm feeling in my heart. We could conceivably be entering into the finest hour for the church of Jesus Christ, the true church of Jesus Christ, the blood washed church of Jesus Christ, the genuine brothers and sisters in Christ in the church of Jesus Christ.

Praise God. In the gospel of John chapter 17, Jesus prayed a prayer for you and I. He was speaking to his father. He says, but now I come to you and these things I speak in the world that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves.

I've given them your word and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not pray that you should take them out of the world, but that you should keep them from the evil one.

They are not of this world, just as I am not of this world. Sanctify them by your truth, set them apart, make them different. Oh God, your word is truth and you have sent me into the world. I've also have sent them into the world and for their sakes, I sanctify myself that they also may be sanctified by the truth.

In other words, Christ is saying, father, for their sakes, I set myself apart to suffer what needs to be suffered. That also they may have the power to be set apart in an ungodly time to do and to fulfill the full calling of their mission while they live in this world.

I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who believe in me through their word. Here's the prayer that they all may be one as you father are in me and I, and you, that they may also be one in us, that the world may believe that you sent me and the glory, which you gave me, I've given them that they may be one, just as we are one, I in them, you in me, that they may be perfect in one and that the world may know that you've sent me and has loved them as you have loved me.

Christ's Prayer for a Multicultural Church

We are living in a moment in history where we're watching scripture fulfilled right before our eyes. It is truly amazing. If you are a student of especially of that, which is prophetic, you see the armies of the world are lining up just as the Bible said they would.

Everything is unfolding just as Christ said it was going to unfold. But this last day, this last day is going to be marked by bitter divisions, especially along ethnic and racial lines. It will be all throughout the world.

There'll be this sudden flood of hatred, one for another. People will gravitate to that, which is culturally, socially, linguistically, and racially familiar and start to shake their fist at everyone else.

What a glorious opportunity God has given us as the body of Jesus Christ, especially here in New York city, where 104 different nations are gathered together to worship God. Praise God for that. We are on a prayer meeting on Tuesday night now in 179 nations throughout the world where people from around the world are coming in online and they're looking at you and they're looking at me and they begin to realize as Jesus prayed, only God could be doing this.

Only God could be bringing these people together. Only God could be giving them the power to love one another. Statisticians say it can't be done. You can't bring together this many people and have them walk together in unity and in love.

That's what the statisticians, the church statisticians say. Well, let them say what they want to say. My Bible says we can become one as Christ and the father are one. Thank God. Thank God. Now, David finds himself surrounded by a society bent on wickedness, bent on division, bent on evil speaking.

And he prays and says, keep me as the apple of your eye, hide me under the shadow of your wings from the wicked who oppress me and from my deadly enemies who surround me. Your deadly enemies are everything, every voice around you that will try to take you out of that fellowship that God has prescribed his church to be.

That will try to sow bitterness and division in your heart. I want to make a statement this morning, and I want you to hear me on this. If there's anybody in this church listening to my voice and you are promoting division between culture to culture, language to language, social status to social status or race to race, this is not the church for you.

You do not belong in this church. And so I strongly advise you to get up and get out if you're not willing to repent, because if you don't, we're going to help you find the exit door in this house. You will not sow division here.

Praise be to God. This is the church of Jesus Christ. This is the body of Christ. This is the code of many colors that God gave to his son. What an awesome thing it is to be part of the testimony of God on the earth in this generation.

And whether or not you fully understand it, God has opened the door, the window to this church, to many nations now throughout the world who are coming in and beginning to understand. Unity is possible.

Genuine biblical love is possible. We can get along with each other in Christ. Hallelujah to the Lamb of God. David says, arise, O Lord, and confront him and cast him down. Deliver my life from the wicked with your sword.

In other words, with your word, God, deliver me from those who would try to sow something in me that you don't want into my life. God, deliver me from my own heart that wants to hold onto and harbor past injustices and speak about it every day.

God, deliver my heart. Deliver me with your word, O God. That's got to be the cry of every saint of God. We are a city being set upon a hill, and the testimony of God will not, cannot, must not be hidden in this generation.

We have an opportunity to show this fragmented, bitter, divided, ever-vengeful society. There is a way to life. There is a way to freedom. There is a way to hope. There is a way to a future. And it's found in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who died to forgive us our sins.

Living in the Likeness of Christ

David says, as for me, I will see your face in righteousness. I will be satisfied when I awake in your likeness. I love the original King James. He basically says, I'll be satisfied when I wake up with your likeness.

I will be satisfied, O God, to have your heart, your character formed in me. I will be satisfied to turn away from my thoughts and my ways and my own darkened heart that would want to cause me to go in the wrong direction.

I will be satisfied to be an ambassador of a kingdom of forgiveness. I will be satisfied to do the will of God and not my own will. I will be satisfied to have the touch of God upon my life every morning when I get up to say, O God, thank you for one more day to speak good things, one more day to talk about grace, one more day to encourage people to forgive one another and not to be part of that sewer that is causing people to hate and to blame in our society today.

By the grace of God, we will represent the one who went to a cross that all men, women, and children may be forgiven. Let the ungodly pursue what they will, but I choose to worship you in truth. I will not make excuses for wrong thinking.

This word is going to be that which governs my heart, my life, and my mind. I will not be a part of any division in the house of God or the nation. I will not be a partaker of it. Praise be to God. Thank God.

I will wake up each day with the reflection of who you are on my countenance. I will fight against no one, but I will fight for everybody. That heaven might be their home and my eternal home as well. Protect me, O God, from being swallowed up by the evil and divisive speech of our day.

It's not going to get any better, folks. It's going to get worse. I think it could get to the point where our cities become difficult to govern. Such vilification, and we're moving rapidly to a place where people, the unstable and those who will be made unstable by wrong thinking will think they can do violence even in the name of God.

It's such a tragedy. Help me to live for the benefit of all people and to even love those who have caused me pain. That is the church of Jesus Christ. That is the coat of many colors. That is the testimony.

That is the reason why we sing the way we do and have the joy that we have. We will not ever allow division to come into this church. Proverbs says an angry countenance turns away a backbiting tongue.

So you have my permission to put on your angry countenance when anybody tries to divide you from anybody else. You just tell them, you just get away from me right now. Just stop speaking and get away from me.

You're not taking away the blessing of God from my life. You are not drawing me into division. You're not drawing me into your hatred. You're not drawing me into your racism, whatever it is. I'm not going there.

I'm not going with you. You go if you want, but I'm not going with you. Praise be to God. Let me never divide the body of Christ. Now, if David had to pray this prayer, David, the sweet psalmist who killed a lion and a bear and Goliath, David, who had the oil of God poured on his head from the prophet Samuel, David, who knew he was called to rule and reign.

If David had to pray for that protection, how much more do you and I have to pray? How much more do we not have to just assume that we will do things that are right and forget that we have a capability of moving in a direction that is wrong?

That's why I encourage everybody listening to the sound of my voice. You must read your Bible now. The word of God is the lamp for your feet and the light for your path. The word of God is where the promises of God are that will help you to become the man or woman that God has designed you to be.

The word of God, according to David and others, it will keep you from the paths of the destroyer, the one who comes to steal, kill, and destroy. You'll be kept from that path by staying in the word of God.

And folks, as much as we love you, as much as the pastors of this church dig as deep as we can in the word of God for your sake, we can't do it all. You have to get in there yourself. You've got to open this book in the morning and say, God, help me.

Help me to be like you. Help me to understand your word. And it's not volume, it's the quality of what you do read, that you understand it. Help me to meditate on your word. Let it establish my thoughts.

Let my heart, my ways be established in your word. God, help me not to forget that I am an ambassador of forgiveness and reconciliation. Don't let me be found drawn down that river of the ungodly who want to divide and accuse and vilify and name call.

Don't let me go there. And then at the end of the day, as David said, you say to visit me in the night, oh God, and try me and prove my heart. How has my speech been today? Have I spoken well of other people?

Has my speech caused anyone to be thirsty for the kingdom of God? Have I healed wounds as I traveled through the day or have I just gone with the multitude as they head down this pathway of bitterness and division?

David had to pray, said, God, you have to help me. You've got to give me the strength. He said, uphold my steps in your past that my footsteps may not slip for he knew the frailty of his own heart. And you and I need to know it as well.

If we get out of the word of God, if we start losing communion with God, the next thing you know, we're in the lunchroom and we're just saying the same, spewing the same filth as everyone else around us, drawn down that river of destruction.

And we're not making a difference for God. If David had to pray it, then you and I have to pray it as well. Lord, protect me from being swallowed up by the evil and divisive speech of our day. Protect me, oh God, protect me because I will answer for my words.

You will too. I'll answer for my words. You see, I thank God there's a lot going on in the country today that can divide, but I thank God there's more going on in the word of God that can bring us together.

And God has given us an opportunity to be a testimony like none other. Oh, thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus. I don't know what happened in that cave, but I know that as they met with King David and these men were discontent and distressed when they met with God, they came out of their mighty and many of them got to dance with David behind the ark as the presence of God was once again ushered into Jerusalem.

They went in weak and they come out strong. They went in defeated and they come out warriors for a righteous cause, for a good cause. And they knew that God was with them. Help me to live for the benefit of others.

The Altar Call for Love and Reconciliation

Oh God, don't let me be selfish. Help me, Lord. Help me to understand the pain that others may be experiencing and help me to be a vessel that can bring healing into their hearts. Don't let me be found among the dividers.

And God helped me to love people who have hurt me because that's what you did, Jesus. Father, forgive them, you said. You were beaten beyond human recognition. The pain was immeasurable. It was going through your body, the nails in your wrists and in your feet, crown of thorns on your head.

And all that came out of your mouth was, Father, forgive them. They don't know what they do. God, would you help me? Would you help me to lay down the wrong, if I have the wrong sword in my hand, would you help me to lay it down?

Would you help me to be kind? Would you help me to love, especially in your church? And among your people? Because you said that would be irrefutable evidence that Christ came and died for the lost. That there would be a love among the people of God that this world cannot reproduce.

Even in its best efforts, it can only be born by the spirit of God. And that's what God will do. I'd like to give an altar call this morning for every person here and those that are online at home. And you know, you know, your speech has not been what it should be.

But like King David, you have the courage and the humility to say, God, would you help me? Would you help me to speak right? Do you help me to think right? Would you help me to esteem your body? Do you help me to love your people?

Remember Paul said in the book of Corinthians that many people in the church are weak and sickly. And some have even spiritually fallen asleep because they don't understand. They haven't discerned correctly what it means to be part of the body of Jesus Christ.

They've come in, they want salvation, but yet they've held on to forms of division in their midst. And it's putting them to sleep spiritually because this kingdom is all about love and forgiveness. That's what it's all about.

So God, would you help us to speak right? Now, father, I thank you that you have given me your heart today. I thank you for the ability to speak this word. I thank you, God, with all my heart, Lord, for you are speaking to us as a church for you have opened the window of this church to many, many people throughout the world.

It is a very unique place where you brought together people from over a hundred nations as a testimony of who you are and what you can do when people turn to you. And so God, we ask you, Lord, to protect us.

We ask you to hold us, keep us from the paths of the destroyer, help us to be satisfied, to be like you. We don't need to be like anybody in the world, but to be like you every morning when we awake, help us to have open hearts, to let you examine our speech at the end of the day and give us a truly humble heart.

God, I ask you, Lord, for a literal explosion of love in this church. 30 years ago, you had pastor David Wilkerson write the words on the marquee of this church, the church that love is building. I thank you, God, that was as prophetic as anything that's ever been spoken in this pulpit.

This is a church that love is building. And so we ask you, Lord, to extricate all hate from this building. God, we thank you, starting with our lips, our mouths, our report in Jesus' name. We're going to stand in just a moment.

And if you want to just come forward and say, God, protect me. I feel like David, I feel surrounded. I'm surrounded in the workplace. I feel surrounded in society. I feel there's just such evil speech.

It's getting into my spirit. And I don't want this to govern my life. And as we stand, if God's speaking to you, just come and join those that are already on their way to the front of this altar. Let's stand balcony, go to either exit, main sanctuary, just slip out.

We're going to worship for just a little while. In the annex, you can step between the screens, the same in North Jersey. And people online, you can stand right up in your living room, wherever you are.

And we're going to pray together for a love and unity that only God, only God could give to his church. Praise God. Father, God, in Jesus' name. Lord, the love that you speak about in your word is only attainable by your Holy spirit and by the promises that you give to us.

Lord, for left to ourselves, we will bitterly divide as a society around us is doing. But God, there is a unity that you speak of and a love. You said father, they might be one as you and I are one God almighty God.

There's, there's not even a paper thin division between you. And so Lord, we ask God that that same spirit come upon us as a people, Lord. And as this world divides along racial ethnic lines, linguistic lines, and cultural lines, that we would be found coming together as your body throughout the world, Lord, that we would truly love one another God, no matter what our language or what country we're in Lord, that we would love one another the way that you have called us to love that the world may know.

The world may know that Jesus Christ was sent to pay the price for sin and to break the bondage of evil. God, we thank you Lord, for what you are doing in our midst. We yield to it. Oh God, we do surrender all we surrender our grievances.

We surrender our wayward tongues. We surrender our spiritual laziness. God, we surrender it all and ask you to be God in us and God to us and God through us Lord, be our strength, be our life, be our breath, be everything that we are and have and ever will be God almighty.

We ask you Lord, that you would forge a deeper bond of love and unity in this church than we've ever known before. Father, we thank you Lord. We thank you. We thank you. Maybe we'd be able to say the enemy has nothing in us.

He has no access to us. He has no place here. Father, we thank you that this is a church that love is building. Your church is being built by the love of Christ all over the world. God, Lord, we thank you for it.

Help us to be a true testimony. Oh God, to those who are looking in wondering, is it possible? Is it possible? Can people love one another? Can they walk together in harmony? Can they be at peace? Can they truly forgive God?

Let this church be a testimony to this generation of who you are. Oh God almighty. We just thank you for where you're taking us Lord and for what you're speaking to each of our hearts. As David said, we will be satisfied every day when we get up to know that your countenance is upon us and your heart is beating within us Lord.