Hope Worth Having

Pastor Mike will be speaking on How to Seek God’s Guidance Part 1. He will be reading out of Acts 11:1-7.

Many of us are trying to figure out what are the next steps of my life? What is this new chapter in my life? How do I know what God’s will is? How do I know what direction to go? Friends, I want to encourage you to turn to the unchanging, unwavering, and true Word of God.

Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders and we welcome you to the Hopeworth Having radio program. Thank you for being with us and thank you for tuning in today and we’re excited to share God’s Word with you.

We’re gonna be in Acts chapter 11 today and we’re starting a new series on how to seek God’s guidance. So we’re looking forward to what the Bible has to teach us. So let’s get right into Acts chapter 11.

If you have your Bible, I want you to join me in the book of Acts chapter 11. Now I heard about a sign that was posted at a workplace and the sign read this, due to the heavy workload around here, the light at the end of the tunnel has been turned off until further notice.

I’m sure that you have felt like someone turned out the lights at the end of your tunnel. Our lives are seldom from point to point a nice straight lie. We find ourselves in many detours and we find ourselves in difficult situations and we wonder what really just happened.

Well, I have good news for you today and that is according to Romans chapter 8 that every one of us that love Jesus Christ, we are guided and we are led by our Lord and Savior Jesus. The Bible says in Romans 8 14 all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons or the children of God.

The Christian should never worry or even wonder if God is leading them. The key is for us to be surrendered to his leadership, to be submissive to his leadership. When we come to Acts chapter 11 verses 1 through 18, our main text this morning, we find the church, we find the Apostle Peter in a predicament and they are seeking God’s guidance on how to deal with this circumstance that they are in.

And this morning I want to speak to you on how to seek. God’s guidance in your life. So let me just give you a little bit of a background. When we come to chapter 11, Peter is giving a testimony to the church.

He is, if you will, giving an update to the church of what just took place in chapter 10. Those of you that have been with me, and we’ve been studying the book of Acts together, you remember in chapter 10 that Peter ended up on top of a house, and he had a vision, and God told him, do not call unclean what I have designated as clean.

This was profound to the Apostle Peter, because remember that he grew up as a young Jewish boy. He was taught in the very details of the law, not only in school, but in the synagogue, every aspect of his life.

He was told that we’re certain foods that are unclean, that he was not to eat those foods as a Jewish young boy. As he grew up in that, he was committed to that. It was a reflection of his devotion to God.

It was a commitment to his faith. You remember that Daniel was plucked out of his home. He was thrust into a secular environment, and as they were trying to change Daniel and his friends to embrace this new culture, this new philosophy, that they wanted Daniel to change his diet, and how he ate, and Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not eat the king’s meat, that he would not eat food that was unclean.

It was not that Daniel was some kind of a legalistic fanaticate who was out of step with reality, but rather, he was a young man like Peter who was devoted in his faith and did not want to disobey God in any aspect of the law.

When Peter received this vision in chapter 10, that he was not to designate anything unclaimed that was clain, anything that God had called clain, that he was also to stretch beyond his Jewish culture.

And he was to take the gospel to the Gentile world, that he was to associate with Gentiles, that he was to share Christ with the Gentiles, that he was to tell them about the good news that the gospel is not just for the Jewish nation and the Jewish culture, but it is for all who would believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.

This created a great dilemma for Peter, but out of obedience and submission to God, he did that very thing. He went to the home of a Gentile named Cornelius. This is a chapter 10 of Acts. And he shared Christ and Cornelius the Bible says was saved and his family was saved.

and they were all baptized. My friends, when Peter had engaged in leading this Gentile to Christ and baptizing this Gentile and his whole family, the word began to spread because you know how church gossip can go, amen?

I mean they probably broke out their cell phones texting each other. Did you hear what the Apostle Peter did? Did you hear that he associated with the Gentiles? Did you hear what was going on? And friends, things were really happening.

The early church had been a little bit resistant to the gospel going out to the ends of the earth. They were okay with Jesus saying that we were to be witnesses for him in Jerusalem. But Samaria and to the uttermost of the earth, well that was a little bit difficult when you study the book of acts.

As you start watching, you see that there’s still this strong connection of these believers, these Jewish believers, still connected to the old covenant, still connected to the Jewish traditions, still involved into the Jewish mindset.

We see this in chapter 8, we see it in chapter 9, we see it in chapter 10. I want you to go back to chapter 10 for a second just so you can capture what I’m trying to say in verse 14 of chapter 10. The Bible says, but Peter said, not so, Lord, for I have never eaten anything common or unclean.

And a voice spoke to him again the second time what God has cleansed. You must not call common. This was the dilemma that was upon Peter. The early church was loyal to Judaism. Peter was loyal to Judaism.

because it was an expression of his devotion to God. But God was leading the church to leave behind Judaism, to understand that all that the law required was fulfilled in Jesus Christ. And he was step by step leading the people of God away from Judaism and into Christianity, the new covenant, he was leading them to reach out beyond the regions of Judaism and Israel.

And instead of them abstaining from foods, God was communicating to Peter and the church that the Gentiles could be welcomed into the community of faith, and that all foods and all people would be welcomed if God had blessed and called.

This was a new mindset for you and I today. We wonder what’s the problem, but I want you to see the context so you can get what’s happening in chapter 11. I want you to pick up with me in verse 1. Now the apostles and brethrens who were in Judea, this is the church, heard that the Gentiles had also received the Word of God.

And when Peter came up to Jerusalem, those of the circumcision contented with him, they argued with him, saying, you went into the uncircumcised men and you ate with them. But Peter explained it to them in order from the beginning, saying, I was in the city of Joppa praying and in a trance I saw a vision and object descending like a great sheet let down from heaven by four corners and it came to me when I observed it intently and considered I saw four -footed animals of the earth,

wild beasts creeping things and birds of the air and I heard a voice saying to me rise Peter kill and eat but I said not so Lord for nothing common or unclean has at any time entered my mouth but the voice answered me again from heaven what God has cleansed you must not call common.

Now this was done three times and all were drawn up again into heaven at that very moment three men stood before the house where I was having been sent to me from Caesarea then the spirit told me to go with them doubting nothing moreover these six brethren accompanied me and we entered the man’s house and he told us how he had seen an angel standing in his house who said to him send men to Joppa and call for Simon whose surname is Peter who will tell you word by which you and all your household will be saved and as I began to speak the Holy Spirit fell upon them as upon us at the beginning that I remembered the word of the Lord how he said John indeed baptized with water but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit if therefore God gave them the same gift as he gave us when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ who was I that I should I could withstand God when they heard these things they became silent they glorified God saying then God has also granted to the Gentiles repentance to life this story that unfolds for us in Acts chapter 11 gives us four principles that helps us on how to seek God for guidance in our life and I want you to see that the first principle is that we see his guidance through the confirmation of God’s word.

Let’s go back to verse one, and again you see that in verse one, that the people heard that the Gentiles had received the word of God. Jump down to verse nine, the Bible says, but the voice answered me again from heaven, what God has cleansed, this is God’s word, from you, what God has cleansed, you must not call common.

Then jump down to verse 16, then I remembered the word of the Lord. How he said, John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit. God was calling on Peter and the church to move beyond Judaism and to move into the new covenant to believe in the fulfillment of Jesus Christ.

It was a perplexing decision that was before Peter. It was a humongous shift in the life of the church in the early days in Jerusalem. And as they’re trying to figure out, is this the right thing to do?

Do we go this direction? We see that in the life of Peter and in the life of the church, that their understanding of what was God’s will for my life, what is God’s will for our congregation, what is God’s will for us as a people who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, they found confirmation.

Through God’s word, God’s word was the message that the apostles taught. It was the word that the Samaritans received. It was the message that the Gentiles received as Peter proclaimed the gospel of Jesus Christ.

But friends, as you and I are trying to seek what is God’s will for my life, we must seek it through the confirmation of his word. We must open this Bible that we have been blessed with, a letter from God Almighty, and we must remember the words that he has spoken to us.

we must align our obedience to God and following his plan for our life in relation to his word. The Bible says in 1 Thessalonians 2 and verse 13, for this reason we also thank God without ceasing because when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you welcomed it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which also effectively works in you who believe.

Now many of us face decisions every day. Many of us deal with complexing situations and circumstances. Many of us are trying to understand how to deal with difficult people in our families or in our workspaces or perhaps even in our community.

Many of us are trying to figure out what are the next steps of my life? What is this new chapter in my life? How do I know what? God’s will is, how do I know what direction to go? Friends, I wanna encourage you to turn to the unchanging, unwavering and true word of God, to find confirmation from God in his word, because wisdom comes from the Lord.

The Bible teaches us in Proverbs two and verse six that the Lord gives wisdom from his mouth comes knowledge and understanding. God speaks to his children through his word. Some of you may be wanting God to just rend the heavens and you want him to directly tell you, but God has given us his word.

And you can look to the Bible to understand what is God’s will for my life. How do I know what I should do? Come to the word of God and let him show you the path. The scripture says in Psalm 119, your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.

Think about it, God’s word is a lamp to my feet. You know what that tells me? That God’s word helps me to know where I’m at, where I stand with him. Sometimes I don’t know where to go because I don’t know where I’m at, because I don’t know where I’m at spiritually with God.

I don’t know where I’m at in my obedience to God and what I need to do. And so we need to get into the word. The word is about revealing to us what we need to change, what we need to correct, what we need to commit to him, what we need to call upon him about.

And so God’s word is a lamp unto my feet, but it is a light unto my path. It not only reveals where I’m at with God, but it shows me my next steps. It is a light to my path. It shows me where I need to go.

Now hear this, God will never call you to do anything that contradicts his word. Do you understand that? Many many years ago when I pastored in Indiana, I know this is hard to believe, but it’s the honest God truth, God is my witness, that there was a man and woman who came into my office and they said, pastor, God has told us that we should leave our spouses and marry each other.

And I said, no he hasn’t, because it’s not in the Bible. There’s nothing in the Bible that teaches in principle or in detail that teaches us that. What the Bible teaches us is totally different. So sometimes you may be led astray by the world, the flesh, or maybe even the devil.

But I want you to be assured that how do I know God’s will? It aligns with the Word of God. That’s how I know. So, when you are seeking God’s guidance, seek it through the confirmation of His Word. Second of all.

You are to seek God’s confirmation, or God’s guidance through the conviction of your spirit. Now go back to verse 11. Here Peter, he is being called to make changes in his life that are deep rooted in his faith of Judaism.

Now the new covenant is upon him. It is the confirmation of God’s word that helps him to make this change. But in verse 11 and 12, we see the conviction of his own spirit. The Bible says at that very moment, three men stood before the house where I was, having been sent to me from Caesarea.

Then the spirit told me to go with them, doubting nothing, moreover, these six brethren accompanied me, and we entered the man’s house. The spirit of God had convicted the heart and the spirit of the apostle Peter that this is what he is supposed to do, that this is what God was calling him to do.

And friends, I want you to understand something that the spirit of God lives in all who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And the spirit of God, just like he pointed Peter into the direction that he wanted him to make, and the change in the person that he wanted him to go see, that God works in his spirit through you.

We are led by the spirit of God every day. We must get up every day and ask the Lord to lead us and to guide us through his spirit. We are not to be led of the flesh. We are not to be led by the world or the philosophy of the world.

But we are to be led of the spirit of God. You see, what Peter is pointing out is that the providence of God in this situation was being offered. unfolded before him, and the Spirit was leading him to go to this man’s house, share the gospel, and how wondrous was it that this man got saved, his whole family got saved, this man gets baptized, his whole family gets baptized, the Spirit of God had convicted him that this is what he needs to do,

and there are times that the Spirit leads you to talk to someone, the Spirit leads you to text someone, the Spirit leads you to call someone, the Spirit leads you to send a card to someone, to reach out to someone, to minister to someone, to just be a blessing to someone, and when the Spirit of God is leading you, you know that you are following the will of God in your life.

Now you might wonder, how do I know when the Spirit is leading me? How do I know? when the Spirit is leading me? Well, let me give you a few things that’ll help you understand the leadership of the Spirit.

First of all is prayer. Prayer will always help you to sync up with the Spirit. When I take time to just shoot arrows of prayer to God, Lord, are you leading me? Is your Spirit telling me to do this?

Are you telling me not to do this? Some of you have been prompted to get out of your bed in the middle of the night and to pray for your children and your grandchildren. It’s the Spirit of God that is moving you.

And you don’t know, and you may never know until you get to heaven all that the power of that prayer did for your children and your grandchildren and how it may have protected them from a very difficult situation from the attacks of the devil or the attacks of this world upon their lives.

But I assure you this, that as we are praying, we are gonna be more sensitive to the Spirit of God. The second key word to knowing the leadership of the Spirit is peace. You see, there is a peace that comes from God.

The Bible tells us that He gives us a peace that passes all understanding, may not make sense to the world, may not even make sense to our own understanding. Remember in our scripture reading that we learned in Proverbs 3 that we’re not to lean on our own understanding, but we’re to acknowledge Him in all of our ways.

One of the ways that I acknowledge Him is I seek Him in prayer, and He gives me His peace in my heart to know, listen to what the prophet Isaiah said. He said, you will keep Him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed or focused on you because He trusts in you.

You see, I want you to know that I can know the leadership of the Spirit in my life through the peace that God gives me. That as I am praying, I am seeing God at work and I recognize that He fills my heart with His peace and so I reach out, I minister, I walk up to that stranger and I share the gospel of Christ or I.

and minister to whatever their particular need is. This is the work of God in your life. Church, we have to be more sensitive. We have to recognize that God is always at work. He is not only at work in me and through me, but he is at work around me.

And he wants to use you like he used Peter to help others to know Christ. Have you ever thought about that? What if Peter would have said, you know what, God, I’m not doing that. I don’t know Cornelius.

I’m not going there. I’m going to just stay at home where it’s more comfortable. I’m just going to do my own thing. And I’m going to let Cornelius do his thing. But no, he was led of the spirit. The spirit told him to go.

And he went, he went. Friends, I want you to know that you can be sensitive to the spirit and you can be led of the spirit by prayer, by peace. And let me give you the third one, by God’s principles, or God’s word.

Now again, the Spirit will never lead you in contradiction to the word of God. The Spirit will lead you through the word of God. The word of God and the Spirit work simultaneously together in your life.

That as you’re reading the word of God, He is prompting you, He is convicting you, He is challenging you to get out of your comfort zone. He is calling you to a particular task. He is calling you to a particular cause.

He is calling you to a particular mission. And so we must be sensitive to these principles in God’s word that are instructing us and leading us and even convicting our own spirit that we should do this.

I promise you that every day of your life, God wants you to make an impact upon someone. He wants you to make an impact upon someone. Some of you would like to make impact upon people that you don’t even know, but I would recommend you start with the people you do know.

God wants you to influence the people that you know, and then He’ll use you in a greater way as you are faithful and saying, Lord, how could I be a blessing to my children? How can I be a blessing to my grandchildren?

How could I be a blessing to my spouse? How could I be a blessing to my church family? How could I be a blessing to the people that are already all around me every day? Help me, Lord, to respond in grace and to be led of the Spirit of God in ministering to people.

As I’m seeking God’s guidance, I not only want Him to guide me and confirm to me His will through His word, but I want Him to convict me in my spirit. Now, the leadership of the Spirit is a unique thing that we must understand, sometimes as believers.

we don’t know is this the flesh, is it the devil, is it the world, is it the spirit. Keep in mind this as you are trying to discern the leadership of the spirit, that the devil and the world and the flesh are always condemning you, but the spirit of God is always encouraging and building you and calling you to a greater work.

Many times I meet with believers who feel very convicted in their life, perhaps maybe about unresolved sin in their hearts, maybe unresolved anger and there is some bitterness in their life and there are struggles in their hearts about these things.

And they say to me, pastor, is this God speaking to me or is this the world? Listen, the devil condemns you. The devil says you’re a loser. The devil says you don’t have a relationship with God. The devil tries to tell you that you’re never gonna amount to anything.

But let me tell you what the Spirit says. The Spirit says you’re more than a conqueror. The Spirit says that you are led in triumph with God Almighty. The Spirit says that Jesus Christ went to the cross and if you confess your sins and you bring it to God and if you’re honest with him and humble before him, he’ll take that sin and he’ll cast it as far as the east is from the west to be remembered no more.

The Spirit tells you that you have a new creation, a brand new start in the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the work of the Spirit. It is not the work of the devil. And so I want you to listen what you’re hearing.

I want you to discern what you’re hearing and that’s how you’ll know whether you are being led of the Spirit or you’re being led of the devil or the world. Now the third way that we seek God’s guidance is not only through his word and through the Spirit, but I want you to see through the circumstances of your own decision.

In verses 13 through 17, here what we see is an amazing unfolding that these circumstances seem to take place in the life of Peter that he cannot fully explain. But he says in verse 13, he told us how he had seen an angel standing in the house who had said to him, send men to Joppa and call for Simon whose surname is Peter.

Now while Peter is receiving a vision, you remember in chapter 10 that Cornelius was receiving a vision. And God was bringing the saint and the sinner together that the sinner might find Christ. God was working providentially in the life of Cornelius and he was working providentially in the life of Peter.

It’s no accident that your path is crossing people who are hurting. It’s no accident that God is putting people into your life that are struggling. You might feel like, hey man, this is too much drama.

I can’t handle all this mess that people are in, but I’m here to tell you that God is bringing about people in your path so that you can minister to them and make a difference in their life. Well, the good news is that God does guide his people.

Sometimes we may feel like we’re not sure what to do, which direction to go, what decision to make, but I want you to know that God is leading his people and he shares through the life of Peter in Acts chapter 11 some of the ways that he does that.

And I want to encourage you to follow these principles on how to seek God’s will. And I think one of those ways is through the word of God. And so as you are under the word, in the word, saturated by the word, you’re going to have more wisdom.

You’re going to have the mind of Christ and you’re going to have the understanding of God’s will. So make that effort to be empowered in the word of God. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.

The post How to Seek God’s Guidance Part 1 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on How to be Free From Prejudice Part 2. He will be reading out of Acts 10:1-48.

The gospel is not just for Americans. The gospel is not just for your family. The gospel is to go to whoever and he will save whoever believes in him and calls upon his name. The forgiveness of sins will be upon their life.

This is Hope Worth Having and I am your host Pastor Mike Sanders and we are looking forward to sharing the hope that is only found in Jesus Christ with you through our radio program and today we’re going to be right back in Acts chapter 10 and we’re continuing that study on how to be free from prejudice.

Just a reminder that the Bible teaches us that the ground is level at the foot of the cross and the Bible invites all to come, repent and believe in Christ. So let’s learn more about that as we study together.

There is a God who is watching and he hears your prayers. He is near and dear to the broken heart of the scripture says we see that Peter was a man of prayer. We see that he was seeking divine guidance.

We see that God was using prayer to change Peter. Let me tell you something about prayer is that so many of us we look at prayer and we’re like hey God we want to tell you what’s going on as if God didn’t know.

We want to say hey God we just want to make sure that you know what is happening but I assure you that we have a God who knows all things but prayer is not so much for you to inform God as much as it is for God to inform you because prayer is that moment when our hearts are humbled and surrendered before an almighty God and where God is aligning our hearts with his heart where God is changing us to be more compassionate and he is changing us to be more committed and devoted.

it to his cause and his purpose in the world. What was God doing in the moment of prayer and the life of Peter? He was changing Peter because Peter was committed to the old covenant. Remember we study the book of Acts and the Bible says at the early beginning of the book of Acts that they were daily going to the temple.

What’s that tell me? That tells me that the early church, that many of those Jewish believers were still, they were still stuck in that regiment of the Old Testament of going to the temple daily. They were still stuck in some of those traditions of the old covenant.

It’s not till we get to Acts 15 that the church begins to break away from some of these traditions that were being forced upon them through the Jewish faith. And so Peter is on the housetop. He is praying and God is trying to help him to see that God is going to…

make a change. And God is going to change Peter to accomplish that. How does God prepare us through circumstances? He prepares us through circumstances. We see that Cornelius as well as Peter were going through some unique circumstances.

Peter was very particular. He was just hungry. He was just hungry. And what does God do? He uses that hunger and to cast a vision upon Peter so that he would see that all that God has created is claimed.

The Jewish people under the old covenant, they could only eat certain foods and they could only partake of certain animals. And so Peter being that good young Jewish man, he was not about to violate the old testament or the old covenant.

But the Bible tells us in verse 15 that God said to Peter, what God has planned, you must not call common. The centurion Cornelius, he was a man who was seeking God and God was using even his affluence and his prestige and his accomplishments.

He was showing him that none of these things never satisfy. These things don’t fulfill the heart. These are the things that may be popular in the world, but they do not change the heart. They do not fulfill you.

There’s always that vacuum in the heart of someone who is looking and searching and they try everything that the world has to offer that they might be fulfilled only to find. They’re at a dead end road.

Cornelius was seeking God, looking for answers. God uses circumstances in all of our life. That’s why I’m telling you, you say, why is God doing this? Why is God doing that? It may be that God is preparing your heart that you might share with someone who doesn’t know Christ and he is preparing their heart so that they’ll look to him.

So many people look to their wealth. They look to the military might of a nation or they look to the political favoritism of a government. And what they find is that none of those things will answer what the great need in their heart is.

The only answer to the heart of sin is Jesus Christ, who saves us from our sins. Yeah, church. Now you need to wake up, church. I know you’re struggling. It’s Sunday morning, but God is working. God often allows circumstances into our life, hear me, to address our weaknesses.

God allowed something in Peter’s life to help him see his bias, to change his prejudice that he had to those who were beyond Judaism and of the ethnicity of the Jews. I also wanna tell you that God changes us and prepares us through his word.

We said through prayer, through circumstances, through his word, it took Peter three visions from God and a word. from the Spirit of God, before he finally got the message. But he finally got it. God speaks to us, God sent a messenger, an angel to Cornelius.

He sent the angel with his word to Cornelius on what to do and how to meet with Peter and to find this true salvation. God used his word. He usually has a messenger who brings his word into your life.

Peter brought the message of the gospel to Cornelius who was in need of salvation and God will speak into our lives through his word and God will open his truth to us and God will use his messengers to help share his wonderful message with us so that God can prepare us to do what he has called us to do.

But the question is, how many times does God have to speak to you before you will respond to him? How many times does God have to bring a tragedy in your life before you will finally surrender your heart to God and do what he has called you to do?

Does God have to knock you flat on your back, put you in the hospital where you can only look up before you will finally say, Lord, I am surrendered to you? Or are you walking with the Lord and you hear his sweet gentle voice and you know when he’s speaking into your heart?

Does God have to break you down before you’ll finally obey and you’ll finally follow what his good work of preparation is in your heart? We said to you at the outset that if we’re gonna be free from prejudice, we must believe God’s sovereign preparation in our own hearts and in the hearts of others.

But number two, we must demonstrate a submissive will. I want you to come to verse 21. The Bible says Peter went down to the men who had been sent to him from Cornelius and said, yes, I am he whom you seek.

For what reason have you come? And they said, Cornelius, Centurion, a just man, one who fears God, and has a good reputation among all the nation of the Jews, was divinely instructed by a holy angel to summon you to his house and to hear words from you.

Then he invited them in. This is Peter. He lodged with them. On the next day, Peter went away with them, and some brethren from Joppa accompanied him. And the following day, they entered Caesarea. Now Cornelius was waiting for them and called together his relatives and close friends.

As Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him. He fell down at his feet, and he worshiped him. But Peter lifted him up and saying, stand up, I myself also am a man. And as he talked with him, he went in and found many who had come together.

Then he said to them, and I want you to see this, you know how unlawful. It is for a Jewish man to keep company with or to go to one of another nation. But God has shown me that I should not call any man common or unclean.

You see, when Peter finally heard the vision and he finally responded, he was submissive to God’s will for his life. The Lord is looking for surrendered hearts. He’s not looking for better methods and stronger people.

He’s looking for hearts that are fully surrendered. God works through people and God will work through your life when you are surrendered to the will of God. When you say, Lord, okay, I don’t understand it, but this is what you’ve called me to do.

Okay, God, you want me to step out and do this. Now, there’s two key things for me to have a consistent, surrendered heart to God. I want you to write these two words down. Number one is obedience. You must be willing to obey God.

You must be willing to obey God even when it doesn’t make sense. You know, sometimes the commands of God, why they seem odd or maybe they seem different. But let me tell you how the economy of God works.

The economy of God is not like the world and the world says, I believe it when I see it. But God says, believe it and you will see it. Do you understand that? And sometimes what God says, like this Molly getting baptized, people say, well, I don’t understand why we got to do that, pastor.

Let me tell you why, because if you say you’re a believer and you’re not willing to obey Jesus when he tells us to get baptized, what makes you think he can trust you to obey him down the road when he needs you to do A, B, or C for him.

Obedience is your first step. Obedience and baptism is your first step. of spiritual maturity and a surrendered heart to the Lord Jesus Christ. That’s why all through our journey, we are called to obey God.

Remember Abraham? Remember that God said Abraham, pack up everything and take your family and get out. And I’ll tell you where to go later. Now again, most of us, we would want to budget. We wouldn’t want to know our destination.

We would want to know details and we’d be texting God and we’d be saying, now God, I need to know this and I’d need to know that. But you know what God wants is obedience. He wants obedience. The second thing to help me have a surrendered, sustained, surrendered heart is faith.

It is faith, I want you to understand something. The scriptures teach us in Hebrews 11 six, without faith it’s impossible to please him for he that cometh to God must believe that he is and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

It is by faith that you please God. You say, my heart is submissive and surrendered, Pastor Mike. Well, then I say to you, walk by faith. The Bible does not say the just shall live by explanation. The just shall live by faith.

Do you trust God? The Bible teaches us in Proverbs three, verse five and six that we’re to trust the Lord with all of our heart. Not half your heart, not a quarter of your heart, not three quarters of your heart, not even 99%, but trust the Lord with all your heart.

The Bible says, and acknowledge him in all your ways. And the Bible teaches us that he will direct our past. We are called to trust the Lord. We are called to follow him by faith. Now there are three ways in this generation that you and I can display obedience and faith as we’re reaching out to people.

Now listen, hang on to this. First of all, make sure that you show no hesitation of befriending people who are unlike you. You remember what Peter did? He opened the door, come on in. And he developed a friendship with these people.

And he told them up front, you know the Old Testament tells me that I’m not supposed to be with you. I’m not to hang out with you because you people are unclean. But I wanna tell you that God in the new covenant through the power of the cross and the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, that he has now launched a new covenant, that Christ has fulfilled all that was required and necessary in the old covenant.

And we live in a new covenant. And in that new covenant, we are called to love God and we are called to love people. And even people, are you with me? That are unlike us. I know you have your people that you hang with.

But have you ever tried to love people that are unlike you? Did you know that there are people out there? They’re not like me, and they’re not like you, but they need Jesus Christ. And unless you build a friendship with them, I’m telling you, they may never hear the gospel.

You say, Pastor, this is Franklin County. People will always even indirectly hear the gospel. How about that testimony we heard from a young lady who lived down in Green Castle before COVID? She testified to our church that she grew up in Green Castle, Franklin County, Pennsylvania, and no one ever told her the gospel of Jesus Christ.

So she went to Penn State University, and there were Bible studies on that campus, and somebody invited her to the Bible study, and she heard the gospel for the first time. She was so overwhelmed, she broke down in tears and gave her life to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Don’t assume, don’t assume, that people have heard. But we’re doing every available means to reach every available person, but I rest assure to you that you still have a responsibility to make sure that every person that you come in contact has heard the gospel, and even if they’re not like you.

Let me give you a second way to live out this submissive will through faith and obedience, that is to always show hospitality towards everyone, and opening your home to people and your lives to people.

Hospitality, people say, Mike, why are you so friendly? It’s not that I always want to be friendly, but every time I see someone I don’t know, I think about, are they saved? They need Jesus. Maybe they are saved and they just need encouragement.

I was yesterday at a place and this guy, he said, Pastor Mike, I said, hey, I said, do I know you? He said, no, but I know you. I listen to you on the radio. And I got to talk to him and be an encouragement to him.

He was already saved, trusted Christ. But listen, I could be isolated and I could push people out of my life and I could just be like, I’m not gonna talk to anybody. And I could be that person that says, hey, I don’t need to talk to anybody, but you know what, friends?

God wants you to be hospitable to the young church. He wants you to be a hospital to the sinner. He wants you to be hospitable to people in your lives that he puts in your past because God has called you to be a blessing.

You say, why does God so good to me? Why has God blessed me with so much? Why has he taken care of me? I’ll tell you, because you are blessed to be a blessing. If you’re unwilling to be the conduit of his blessing, he’ll take the blessings away and give it to somebody else, Jerry, who wants to be a blessing, amen.

Brother, I tell you the third thing is show humility before all people. Show humility before all people regardless of their skin color, their income, their education, whatever walk of life, what they’ve done or haven’t done, show humility.

You know how you treat others says a lot about you. Do you agree with that? Do you remember that we read in the text here? Do you remember that when Cornelius finally came into the presence of Peter that he bowed down and he began to worship him?

Verse 26, Peter lifted him up. He said, get up, man. Stand up. I myself also am a man. Now Peter is an apostle. Peter is a Jew. His culture would look down upon Gentiles and he could have just bought in and ate up the human worship.

But you know what? Peter showed humility and said, buddy, I’m just like you. ground is level at the foot of the cross. Listen to me, there are people who are hurting, who are hopeless, who are struggling.

You wanna know how to connect with them? Be humble, be humble. Don’t look down on people. Don’t judge people. Don’t say, listen, I’m the guy that is gonna tell you what you did wrong. But I want you to be humble and accept people where they’re at.

Jesus, listen, he hung out with sinners. Jesus found himself in places and with people that he was accused of being a wine bibber, which means simply he was a drunkard. He was always partying. He was put down because he was around prostitutes.

And I’m just trying to say to you is this, that whoever God puts in your path, don’t look down upon him. Jesus was always reaching out. Jesus was always connecting with people. Why? Because every person, I don’t care what their lifestyle is.

I don’t care what their confusion about their gender is. I don’t care what they have done or have not done that every person is created in the image of the Lord Jesus Christ. And therefore they are worthy of kindness, care and love.

You say, well, they’re not out of my political stripe, it doesn’t matter. Jesus loves them, amen. You mean Jesus would go to the cross and die for somebody who’s not the same political party as me? Do you understand how we have biases, church?

Do you understand how we can not just be prejudice and maybe somebody’s skin color, but somebody’s political background or somebody’s ethnicity? We have to watch out for that. And so I’m challenging you to be a humble person before God almighty.

Look, I want us to demonstrate. to submissive will to God. The third step in being free from prejudice is accepting God’s spiritual plan. In verse 34, I want you to jump down. The Bible says that Peter opened his mouth and he said, in truth I perceive that God shows no partiality.

But in every nation who ever fears him and works righteousness is accepted by him, the word which God sent to the children of Israel preaching peace throughout Jesus Christ, he is Lord of all that word you know, which was proclaimed throughout all Judea and began from Galilee after the baptism which John preached how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth of the Holy Spirit and with power who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil for God was with him.

And we are witnesses of all things which he did both in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem. whom they killed by hanging on a tree. Him God has raised up on the third day and showed him openly, not to all the people, but to witnesses chosen before God, even to us who ate and drank with him after he arose from the dead.

He commanded us to preach to the people, to testify that it is he who has ordained by God to be judged and of the living and the dead. To him, all the prophets witness that through his name, whoever, underscore that in your Bible, whoever believes in him will receive remission or forgiveness of sin.

While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard the word. I remind you of the context that Peter was in the home of Cornelius, and Cornelius had invited all his family and his friends to come.

Who knows how many were there? He probably lived in a nice house and he had it filled with people, and Peter went in there and he preached Jesus unto them. God has a spiritual plan, church. Peter accepted that spiritual plan.

Every one of us must accept this spiritual plan, and that spiritual plan involves that everyone should hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. You say, Pastor, why do you give to missions, and why do you get behind missionaries, and why do you try to encourage these young people to go where they’re called into other nations and to other ethnicities and people groups?

I’ll tell you why. Because God wants the nations to hear the gospel. The gospel is not just for Americans. The gospel is not just for your family. The gospel is not just for those who cut their teeth on the pew and grew up in the church.

The gospel is to go to whoever, and he will save whoever believes in him and calls upon his name the forgiveness of sin. will be upon their life.” The Bible says that the Lord is not slack concerning His promise as some men count slackness but as long suffering to us were not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repent.

Did you know the proclamation of the gospel has a eschatological impact upon the world? What do you mean it has an impact upon the end times because Jesus said in Matthew 24 verse 14 when he was given the signs of the times and they said Jesus tell us what will be the signs of your coming.

He said to his disciples that this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a end is not coming until every person has heard. about Jesus. The end, the second coming of Christ. I’m not talking about the rapture.

The rapture is another event, but I’m telling you the coming of Christ, Jesus said that it would not happen until the entire world. Why do we give? It is not only that we give to missionaries because we have a burden and we love the lost people of the world.

We want to see them come to Christ no matter what their ethnicity is, no matter what their background is, their education might be, what their hurts and their hangups may be in this world. We want them to hear the gospel, but we want them to hear also because it brings faster the coming of Jesus Christ.

How many of you are ready for Jesus Christ to come? I hope that you are ready. My final point to you, and I know you’re super happy, and that is that if we are going to live prejudice -free, we have to pursue sweet fellowship with people outside of our comfort zone.

Jump down to verse 48 of chapter 10. The Bible says he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord, and then they asked him, referring to, they asked Peter to stay a few days. Now Peter could have rejected this request.

He didn’t. He stayed with them. The proof of your conversion is your desire to fellowship with God’s people no matter where you go. I remember when I went to France, Bayou, France, and I couldn’t speak the language, and I was kind of caught off guard because, you know, Pete tried to prepare me and he said they’re gonna want to give you a kiss on the cheek there, Pastor Mike.

And you know I’m not a hugger. I don’t want you hugging me. I want you to stay out of my bubble, okay? If some of you are in conversation with me and you see me backing up, it’s because I think you’re too close to my bubble.

I’m just giving you a little inside of Mike. But man, not only did they they kiss you on your cheek but they kiss you on the other cheek and then they do it twice. And so I was a mess. But I tell you it was such sweet fellowship to be with God’s people in another land, in another country and another language that I could not even understand.

But the one thing that we had in common was the Lord Jesus Christ and the Spirit of God verified to us that we were brothers and sisters in Christ and it was just wonderful to be with the people and even though I could not understand that 90% of what they were saying, I was enjoying all the food that they were given.

And they love for you to eat and those people, they start eating dinner at eight o ‘clock at night and they just eat, it’s wonderful. You say how do the French people stay so skinny? They walk everywhere and perhaps we should pick up this new practice because gas prices are so high, we should walk more, amen?

But what I want to simply say to you is this. Ephesians 2, 19 and 20 reminds us, now therefore you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostle and prophets, Jesus Christ himself, being the chief cornerstone.

Church, we are not strangers among each other, whether it’s in this local fellowship, in the community, or it is in other lands. We are not strangers because of Jesus Christ. We are brothers and sisters in the family of God, and we must make every effort to have sweet fellowship, even if it’s outside of our comfort zone.

I know you got your people, and I know you’ve got your walls, and I know you got your fences, and you only wanna be with those people, but let me tell you something. God’s calling you to step out of your comfort zone.

Fellowship with people that you may not even know, who culturally may be different than you, who educationally may be different, or maybe they just have different quirks about them, but it’s okay because there’s not one person on this planet that God does not love.

God loves, cares for every person. He went to that cross, so all who would believe in him should have eternal life. Peter is coming to terms with his own prejudices in his heart, and God is tearing down those barriers and working effectively in Peter’s life, and it’s such a blessing to watch this because it’s a reminder to all of us that God wants to use us, like Peter, to reach people from all walks of life and nationalities,

and that our goal is to spread the gospel unto the ends of the earth, and that’s not just physically relating to location, but that’s also reaching out. to people who are from different nations or ethnic groups, whatever and however you want to describe it.

We are called to reach them all because that’s what Jesus has asked us to do. So I really am appreciative of this message and what it teaches us in Acts chapter 10. Now we are encouraging you to check out our podcasts.

If you’d like to learn more about some of these things that we’re teaching, you can certainly go to our website and you can check us out there. You can also pick up some of our podcasts on our app, The Open Door Church PA and just at the bottom hit the ministry button and there you can pick up some of the podcasts that are going on that we’re putting out there for you and all designed to enrich you,

strengthen you in the faith. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope, worth having.

The post How to be Free From Prejudice Part 2 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on Principles for Powerful Living (Father’s Day). He will be reading out of 1st Corinthians 16:13-14.

Some of you are wondering why hasn’t the Lord already come? Let me tell you this that God wants to see people saved and that’s why he is holding back and I’m telling you in the moment that that last person is saved then bam the eastern sky is gonna split and God is going to return.

Hello this is Pastor Mike Sanders. We welcome you to Hope Worth Having. Today we’re going to be in 1 Corinthians chapter 16. We’re taking a break from Acts because today we are celebrating Father’s Day and so I want to talk to you today about principles for powerful living.

The Bible says that we are to act like men but it just means that we’re to mature, we’re to grow, we’re to be founded in our faith and the principles that the Apostle gives us helps us to be those strong men for Christ.

So let’s get into the Word of God together. Well today I want to talk about principles for powerful living and it certainly is applicable to all dads but I want you to know it applies to all of us as Christians.

If you’re familiar with the book of 1 Corinthians you know that this was a troubled church in the city of Corinth but the Apostle not only begins with encouragement to this church but he concludes with strong encouraging admonitions to the body of believers and particularly relates to the men in the church and I’m going to be reading from the New King James.

If you’re reading in the King James it’s going to be confusing to you. 1 Corinthians 16 verse 13 through 14 says watch stand fast in the faith be brave be strong let all that you do be done with love.

The Apostle gives some final imperatives to the church. These imperatives are certainly important for us as believers and I want every dad and every father, every mentor to acknowledge some of these imperatives in their own lives and to make sure that we are following these imperatives and that we are moving in that direction in our faith.

I hope that each of us will be encouraged and challenged, especially in light of some of the uncertainty that we live in and that we can be more firm in our faith and fortified in our calling of what God has put upon each of us.

We start out learning the first imperative, which is simply to be alert. Some translations put it like this, pay close attention to. The term is used 22 times in the New Testament and often in reference to being spiritually awake or spiritually alert.

And this is what the apostle was saying to each of us this morning, that there is a great need for us to be awake and to be. Alert now the King James says quiet. It is the same idea. It’s the same understanding It’s just a different language that you’re learning old English But it simply means to be alert to be awake to not be sleeping But to be a tentative to what is going on around you.

You might say why should I be alert? Well friends, let’s first say for our own spiritual formation and health. It’s important for us to be spiritually alert But second of all for your children your grandchildren for those that you are investing in your life that you want to stay spiritually alert so that as you are being that example and as you are making that influence upon that child or that younger person that you are Recognizing the different things that are all around you because of your alertness in Christ Let me give you some areas that you and I need to be alert I want you to write these down this morning But the first area that we should be alert in is in our priorities in our priorities We need to be alert to our priorities.

We need to maintain our priorities people forget. What is Important people forget what matters most in their life I will simply put it out there to you like this that what is most important in your life And what is the priorities of your life is your faith in Jesus Christ and your family?

That’s what I would put out there for you. It’s easy to get involved in our career It’s easy to get involved in other things that are going on that we enjoy doing that we forget To nurture our faith to build upon our faith and to invest in our children I often think about this that if Christians would just reach their own children if they would just invest in their own family What an impact it would make upon the world We have to maintain a priority relationship with Jesus Christ when that begins to crumble all of your other Relationships will crumble because life Life is about relationships,

hear me. I do not say that flippantly. I am telling you that if you get nothing, get this, that life is about relationships. And if you can’t get your relationships right, you can’t get anything right in your life.

Think about it, Jesus taught us to love God. That’s our number one relationship. Jesus taught us to love others, love people. Life is about relationships. Loving God, my relationship with God and my relationship with others.

So make sure that you’re alert to your priorities. The second alertness I want you to have is against Satan. I want you to be on the alert against Satan. The Apostle Peter said this, be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.

Do you get that? He is seeking whom he may devour. You say, well, I’ve been a Christian for a long time, pastor, or I’ve been really digging deep lately. It doesn’t matter, my friends. I mean, that’s all good.

I’m not against it. But I’m just wanting you to know that the devil is always looking for a way to destroy your life, to destroy your family, to destroy the church. And certainly we see the devil already destroying our country, don’t we?

Friends, we’ve got to be alert because the devil wants to destroy the home. He wants to destroy the father. He wants to destroy the leadership within the home. He wants the home to crumble. Because when the home crumbles, the church will crumble.

And when the church crumbles, the community will crumble. And when the communities start crumbling, the nation starts crumbling. That’s why it’s important for every dad to not only have this strong relationship with Christ, but to be alert that Satan is always trying to trap him and to get him going in the wrong direction.

Three ways that the devil likes to mess with us. First is by distracting us. We already talked about priorities, but it’s easy that the devil likes to get shiny things out here. And you’re totally losing focus.

You’re forgetting what’s most important and you get distracted and you get to focusing on the minor things in life. The things that are not really gonna matter 10 years from now or 20 years from now.

And so the devil likes to distract. It’s appealing to the flesh. It’s appealing to your preferences or all these things are fine, but make sure that the devil is not distracting you. His second tactic is to discourage you.

He wants you to be defeated. He wants you to be discouraged. He wants you to quit. He wants you to walk around. with your head down. He wants you to be the kind of person in your home where there’s no joy and there’s no courage and there’s no faith that we’re all just discouraged and we’re ready to throw in the towel.

Listen, dads, you have a big role in that in your home. You need to be that strong leader in your home that is always holding out the hope that is found in our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And the only way that you can always be encouraged is to do like David did.

The Bible says he encouraged himself in the Lord, meaning his relationship with God. He was feeding his faith consistently and he was constantly growing in his faith so that he could be that positive light within the home and not be discouraged, not be defeated.

You can’t walk in the door of your home and talk about how bad everything is. because you will raise children that will be negative, critical, and hateful, and discouraged, and defeated, and say, why would we follow God?

Because there’s no hope in Him. The hope of the world is a dying hope, but the hope of those who love Jesus Christ is a living hope that’s rooted in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Can God’s people say amen?

Listen, the devil will use distraction, discouragement, but He’ll also use division. He’ll use division. He’ll try to divide your home. He’ll turn moms and dads against each other. He’ll turn children against parents and parents against children.

He’ll do everything that He can to cause division in the church. And of course, we see it already in our country. Everybody is divided and against, and we’re all put into these categories, and we’re all told that this is the dividing line, and you’re either over here or you’re over there.

Listen to me, my friends. We fly under the banner of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We’re not gonna divide over sports, preferences, politics, or opinions, or personalities. We’re gonna be united under our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Dads, be careful that you don’t let little things cause division in your home. Differences of opinion. But let me tell you something. We’re all different, but we don’t divide over that. We appreciate and we encourage.

That’s what the Bible means when it says train up a child in the way that he should go, in the way that he’s bent or designed by God. And it’s not just talking about spiritual things. It’s talking about their personality.

It’s talking about their abilities, their giftedness. And some of you are trying to take a square child and you’re trying to put it into a circle. And you’re wondering why there’s so much friction, pushback, and fighting.

Why don’t you let the child be who they are? You say, well, I don’t like the way they are. Well, listen, we have our values, we have our principles, we have our priorities, but we’ve got to give freedom to let our children be unique.

But I don’t want you to allow division in the home because Satan will use it to divide. Now, we need to be on the alert for temptation. Listen to the words of our Savior Jesus. He said, watch and pray lest you enter into temptation.

The Spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. Underscore that in your Bible. The flesh is weak. You want to obey God. You want to do the right thing. You want to live for God and you want to overcome.

But let me tell you something. The flesh is weak. It does not predetermine that we will fail and not be able to resist the devil or resist temptation. But we need to be alert to our weaknesses and we need to understand that the devil knows where we’re weak at.

And the flesh is weak, and therefore we have this responsibility within us to be alert to temptation. We got to be alert, and what helps me to be alert to temptation is to understand that just as we stated, the devil is always looking for a way to trap us.

He’s always looking for a way. So as I learn more about God, I’m trying to learn also more about Mike and what are the areas that he needs to work on. What are the areas that he’s weakened? And so I can again build barriers and boundaries in my life that will help me to stay away from those potential traps and those temptations in my life.

So when our spiritual eyes are shut and they’re sleepy and they’re apathetic, we can fall into sin easily. So every day I’ve got to stay alert for temptation. But another area we need to be alert in is apathy and indifference.

Apathy and indifference. You know, Revelation 3, 1, Jesus said, And to the angel of the church at Sardis write these things, says he who has the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. I know your works, that you have a name, that you are alive, but you are dead.

Activity does not equate to spirituality. You can be active in the church, but inactive in the gospel. You can be active, but you have become apathetic. You’re just going through the motions. You’re just doing whatever is required of you.

There’s no true passion in your heart, in your life for the Lord Jesus Christ. These are areas that we need to keep before the Lord in our personal time. And we need to ask the Lord to forgive us for being indifferent towards him and the gospel and his truth and our calling upon our life.

God wants you to be a Christian that is passionate and zealous for him. That doesn’t mean that we’re always happy clapping. And it certainly doesn’t mean that we don’t have times that we’re dealing with different things and emotions in our life, but we’re still alert and we’re still wanting to make a difference for Christ.

And yes, we go through different seasons of our life. And some of you at the time of your life that maybe you couldn’t do as much as you used to do, but you’re still passionate for the gospel and you’re still passionate for the cause of Christ and you still want to stay on mission for God.

Be alert that the devil doesn’t make you apathetic towards the things of God and the people of God and the principles of God and you become indifferent. We want to be passionate for God. Now another area to be alert, be alert for false teachers.

Be alert for false teachers. The Bible says there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you who will secretly bring in destructive heresies and denying the Lord who brought them and bring on themselves swift destruction.

Remember this. Everything that glistens and glows is not gold, and everything that has the name of Jesus didn’t come from heaven. Dads, you gotta have some discernment. You gotta protect your family, and whether it’s music, or teaching, or books, whatever you’re letting your family be exposed to, make sure that you are filtering and screening out the false teachers.

There are false teachers. I know it’s the 21st century, and can’t we just all get along, and can’t we just love each other? Yes, we can, but we cannot let false teaching destroy our families and destroy our churches.

We cannot get off track with what the Lord and the apostles have taught us, and we cannot go down the path of false teaching. We need to be alert to them. Jesus teaches much about that in Matthew chapter seven.

Take time to read it on your own, to help you to identify false teachers, and to be able to understand how to protect your family from that. Let me tell you another area to be alert, and that is to pray.

Be on the alert to pray. Ephesians 6, 18, having taught the church at Ephesus about the armor of God, Paul concludes and said, with all prayer and petition, pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints.

When we pray, we’ll be alert. When we’re alert, we will pray. We need to remember that God wants us to be a praying people. You never rise above your prayer life. Every one of us needs to commit in our hearts that we are going to be a people of prayer.

Some of you are frustrated, and you have a lot built up in your heart about whatever problems may be going on in the world. And I wanna tell you that rather than dimming the light, why don’t you reach out to others and be a light, and encourage them, but how do I deal with these frustrations, Pastor?

I get on my knees and I pray to you. to God and I share these things with the Lord and I let him work them out. I give them all to him and prayer is a powerful way. Now what happens in our prayer life sometimes is that we can become again apathetic in our prayers or we can become ritualistic in our prayers and all of a sudden we’re ineffective in our prayers.

Well I want you to note in this verse in Ephesians 6 18 he teaches us a key principle about prayer and he says that we’re to pray at all times in the Spirit. When you pray in the flesh you’ll be weak.

When prayer begins in the flesh it’ll be anemic but when prayer is filled by the Spirit, when prayer is led by the Spirit, when prayer is is anointed by the Spirit, that’s when God will use your prayers to make a difference in the lives of other people.

That’s when God is doing a powerful thing in your life. He says with all prayer and petition, pray at all times in the Spirit. When I pray, I like to come to God and just totally surrender to the Spirit and ask the Spirit to guide my thoughts and my prayers and the things that I would like to petition God about.

And I know many of you are very organized in your prayer and I’m glad and I’m excited for that. You’ve got books upon books and journals upon journals and you’ve got everything figured out and you’ve got every missionary prayed for and you’ve got every person prayed for and you’ve got every situation prayed for.

But sometimes God wants you to pray in the Spirit as you are seeking God. Be alert to prayer. The final thing I want you to be alert to is to be on the alert for the Lord’s return. Be on the alert for the Lord’s return.

Someone said, I’m not looking for the signs of His coming, I’m listening for the sound of His coming. Hey friends, I want to tell you that the signs are there and we should be listening and that we have to understand that it isn’t going to be long before the Lord returns.

He can come in any moment and that He could come and call us all home. We need to be alert. Some of you are troubled. I just wish that you would study the Bible. The Bible tells us that before the Lord’s return, it’s not going to get better.

It’s going to get worse. It’s going to get worse. You say, thanks for the encouragement, pastor. I hear you. But I want you to know that the Lord is going to return His promises. Somebody said, why doesn’t the Lord return now?

Well, listen, I love 2 Peter 3 9. He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. You see, some of you are wondering why hasn’t the Lord already come? Can He see the mess that we’re in?

And why doesn’t He see the mess that we’re in? and he come, let me tell you this, that God wants to see people saved. He wants to see your loved ones come to Christ. He wants to see more individuals come to the Lord.

And that’s why he is holding back and he is holding those angels back. And I’m telling you in the moment that that last person is saved, that is supposed to be saved when they receive Christ, then bam, the eastern sky is gonna split and God is going to return and he’s gonna set up his kingdom on this earth, amen?

So here’s the question, are you living in light of Christ’s second coming? Or are you living in light of all the problems of this world? Are you living in light of all the politics of this world? Are you living in light of all the circumstances of this world?

Or are you waking up every day and saying, this could be the day, this could be the day that the Lord returns, let’s maximize it for God, let’s do our most for him and let’s reach another person for the Lord Jesus Christ.

We are taught in this passage to be alert, I want you to go back and see again. He says, stand fast in the faith. The second imperative he gives us is to be firm. And what he tells us to stand fast in the faith, he’s not talking about the faith of trusting God.

He’s not talking about the faith to believe in God, but he’s talking about the faith of truth, the faith of what we believe. He’s saying, stand fast in that faith, what you have learned, the faith of the truth of God.

Stand fast, be firm in that faith. God is telling us to stand fast, to persevere, to not deviate in our faith, to not compromise. We live in a time, unfortunately, of compromise, a time where even churches are backing down from the truth and they are more interested in making sure that they please people rather than pleasing our heavenly Father.

We need to stand for what’s right. You say, pastor, how can I be firm? Well, first of all, I would start out by knowing the truth. Know the truth, study your Bible, know what the Bible teaches, and stand firm in that truth.

Know the truth, because see, some of you cannot respond, nor can you defend the faith in these unique cultural challenges that are before us, and you don’t know what to address, and you don’t know how to answer, and it is simply this, you don’t know the truth.

You’re like a Christian who gets up every morning and eats crispy cream for breakfast. But friends, you can’t have sugar all your life and think you’re gonna be strong in the Lord. You need the meat of the Word, so know the truth and share the truth.

We live in a pluralistic society. When you start saying that Jesus is the only way to heaven, I mean, you’re sending shock waves to people. You are causing people to melt down. But friends, share the truth, share the truth.

The answer is not for us to soften the truth or to change the truth. If we’re gonna change the truth, if we’re gonna change this culture, we gotta share the truth, because the truth will cut through all the foolishness and get right to the heart.

The word of God is powerful and sharper than any two -edged sword. Some of you are trying to say, well, how can I be more palatable to this person so that I can share the truth with them? Friends, don’t be afraid, just share it.

Just tell them. Tell the truth. Live the truth. That’s how you can stand firm. We can’t change people. Only God can change people, and God is working in people’s lives. They have to respond to Him, but we must live in the truth.

Live as truthful people, people who love the Lord, love the truth, and we love what God has taught us in His word without firmness in our spiritual lives. We’re gonna be like ships without anchors. We’re gonna be a people who are living in the midst of a storm of confusion and we’re gonna be tossed like tumbleweed just to and fro everywhere and therefore we must live the word.

We must know it and the Holy Spirit can strengthen us and develop us. Now the third imperative I want you to see but I want you to know he says be brave. I say be mature, be mature. The King James says act like men and the reason that it translates this word by act like men is because it’s the idea of being brave and it’s the idea of showing oneself as a man, a brave man.

The idea is mature courage, mature courage. So be mature. The concept carries the idea of being a man, not a child. He’s saying to us in a real direct way, grow up and be a man of God. Be strong in Christ, quit living like a child.

The apostle said when I was a child, I spoke as a child but now that I’ve become a man, I put away childish things. There comes a time in our spiritual life when we have to put away childish things and we move forward in our faith and we grow and we mature in our faith.

The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 3, verse one and two, and I brethren could not speak to you as to spiritual people, but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ. I fed you with milk and not with solid food for until now you were not able to receive it and even now you are still not able.

You know what? God wants us to mature so we can receive the meat of the word. He wants us to grow so we can receive the truth. He doesn’t want us to get choked on the solid meat of God’s truth. He wants us to mature.

So true maturity is only found in Jesus Christ, and we must nurture that in our life, and you say, well, how can I mature, Pastor? Well, I just wrote down a few things that’ll help you. First of all, you need to have a devotion time with Christ every day.

Now, let me say something about your devotions, okay? Two things I wanna say on one end. First of all, remember that variety is the key. I’m just telling you, if you sit down at the table to eat breakfast or lunch or dinner, and you have the same thing every day after a while, you’re gonna be like, man, I’m tired of this.

So I wanna encourage you to have some variety. Maybe you do a topical study in the Bible. Maybe you do a character study in the Bible. Maybe you study a certain book in the Bible, a certain passage of scripture in the Bible, a certain theme in the Bible, whatever it is, and however it is, it doesn’t really matter.

Just keep doing variety in your time with the Lord. Have some variety. I wanna encourage you to do that. Second of all, in relating to your devotion time to help you mature is that you gotta move beyond the milk.

You gotta move beyond the sappy story. You gotta move beyond the emotional move of these devotions. Some of you use devotion books, it’s all good. I’m not against it, but man, you gotta move beyond. You gotta mature in your faith.

But anyways, that’s the way most people approach their devotion life. A little cup of latte, a lot of sugar, nothing that really challenges me. Just give me a little bit of inspiration so I can feel good, check that off my list, and I can move on in my day of things I need to get done.

When’s the last time you really dug? When’s the last time that God convicted you in your devotion? When’s the last time in your devotion, you said, Lord, I need to confess this sin. I need to bring this to you and make it right with you.

Friends, that’s when you’re having devotion time. That’s when God is working effectively in your life. So how do we mature our devotion time every day? Number two, avail ourselves to the teaching of God’s word.

You know we have so much technology today, you’ve got a lot of opportunity to hear a lot of wonderful teachers. But avail yourself to Bible studies, to Sunday school class, to the preaching and teaching of God’s word.

But let me tell you something, you may not remember everything that Pastor Mike taught, and that’s okay. But it’s like that dinner you had the other night. You don’t remember exactly everything. But when you had it, it was good, it nourished you, it encouraged you, and you enjoyed every bite of it.

And so it is with God’s word. It is a means of grace to your heart that as you are under the teaching of God’s word, whether that’s in a small group, a large group, whatever the capacity, one -on -one, it doesn’t matter as you are receiving the teaching of God’s word.

He is effectively shaping your heart and maturing you for him. The third way to be mature is be accountable. We don’t like to be accountable, but be accountable because accountability helps me to identify areas I need to grow, areas I need to get better at.

Accountability helps me to continue to push myself to press on in my faith and to make sure that I am always growing. The final thing is get plugged in. You see, if you just sit and soak, what good is that?

You’re going to become a sour Christian. But when you sit and you soak up God’s word and you go out and use it, you’re not just a hearer, but you’re a doer. Maturity, reach is its pinnacle as you are out there using the truth that God has spoken into your life.

There are always things that we need to pay attention to. And that’s exactly what the Apostle is trying to do when he tells us to be alert. And that’s what we are challenging you in this passage today.

We hope as men, as fathers, that we are stepping up in a big way and we’re not ashamed of Christ. And I want to also remind you about our website. If you need more resources to train you in the Word, to disciple you in the Word, check out HopeWorthHaving .com.

This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having. Amen. Amen.

The post Principles for Powerful Living (Father’s Day) first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on How to be Free From Prejudice Part 1. He will be reading out of Acts 10:1-48.

So many people look to their wealth, or they look to the political favoritism of a government, and what they find is that none of those things will answer what the great need in their heart is. The only answer to the heart of sin is Jesus Christ, who saves us from our sin.

Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders, and I’m delighted to welcome you to Hope Worth Having radio program this week. Today we’re going to be in Acts chapter 10, and we’re going to be studying how to be free from prejudice.

When we come to Acts chapter 10, Peter is learning that what God has called a clean, we’re not allowed to call unclean, and that God works in very unique way, and he’s making a transition from the old covenant to the new covenant.

So that’s what we’re going to be learning about relating to what the scriptures teach in Acts 10. So let’s get into our Bible and study together. Now when we come to the book of Acts chapter 10, I want you to know that I want to speak on this very controversial, difficult subject.

I’ve entitled the message how to be free from prejudice. How to be free from prejudice. Now I want you to know that I’m not accusing you. I don’t want you to in any way interpret that way, that somehow I am accusing you of some prejudice.

But I want you to know that all of us, whether it’s because of our American heritage, or it is because of our home, the way we were raised, or perhaps even the way that we see the world, it can affect and cause a bias within us in how we see people.

And when we come to our text in chapter 10 of the book of Acts, we see this very much in the life of Peter. He was a Jewish man, and I I want you to remember that the book of Acts is really designed around that one statement that Jesus gave to his disciples in verse eight of chapter one, that they were to be his witnesses, and they were to go to Jerusalem and Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth.

And that is really the whole outline of what the book of Acts is about. We are watching that unfold chapter by chapter as the gospel is going further and further out. But the Jewish people, and specifically in chapter 10, Peter had a little bit of a bias, a prejudice about the gospel going beyond the Jewish nation and beyond just the people who were born in the nation of Israel.

And so now God is working in the heart of Israel. Peter. And we want to learn from this because it can help us with the prejudices that we deal with or even the biases that we have as individuals. I’m reminded of Mark Twain’s classic novel, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

How many of you have ever read that book? It records the following exchange between Tom Sawyer and his friend Huck Finn. And Tom has just informed Huck that he is not welcome in Tom’s game. And Huck is protesting and this is a direct quote from the book.

Now Tom, and again you know the English is bad, okay? I’m just going by why the quote is not that Pastor Mike has issues. But now Tom, ain’t you always been friendly to me? You wouldn’t shut me out, would you Tom?

Tom replies, Huck, I wouldn’t want to and I don’t want to. But what would people say? Why they’d say, huh, Tom Sawyer’s game, pretty low characters in it, and they’d mean you Huck. You wouldn’t like that and I wouldn’t.

That little segment in this fictional novel reminds us about human nature. That there are prejudices within our hearts and biases within our mindsets that are built within us because of our sinful nature and that we have to be alert to these things and the gospel brings them to our attention so that we might make sure that we’re not doing anything that ranks people or classifies people or shuts people out.

I remind you this morning that there is no second -class citizen in God’s kingdom and that the ground is level at the foot of the cross. The gospel of the Lord Jesus. Christ is an inclusive gospel. It is the gospel of inclusion and it shows no favoritism in inviting people to a relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

It is the Apostle Peter in chapter 10 who is coming to terms with his own prejudices, his own biases that existed in him because of the way that he was raised and he was thought he was obeying the old covenant.

He thought that he was doing exactly as he was supposed to in obeying God but the truth is God awakened his heart and showed him that God is no respecter a person and that God is reaching out to all groups of people and God is calling every person into a relationship with him.

You might consider this morning this question are there any people or people groups, perhaps even a nation, a person that I despise, or that I have somehow built a wall towards and I would never want the gospel to come to them.

Well this morning, let’s take a look at this long chapter. We’re not gonna be able to read every verse because we’d be here all night and I know that you can’t do that and it’s almost lunchtime and we gotta get to lunch, amen?

But I want us to just hit some highlights of this chapter and learn how can we be free from prejudices, not just in our own hearts, but collectively as a church family. Number one, believe God’s sovereign preparation, not only in our hearts, but in the hearts of those who do not believe.

Now come with me to chapter 10 and verse one, there was a certain man in Caesarea called Cornelius, a centurion of what was called the Italian regiment, a devout man and one who feared God with all his household, who gave alms generously to the people and prayed to God always.

About the ninth hour of the day, he saw clearly in a vision an angel of God coming in and saying to him, Cornelius. And when he observed him, he was afraid and said, what is it Lord? So he said to him, your prayers and your alms have come up for a memorial before God.

Now send men to Joppa and send for Simon whose surname is Peter. Now I want you to jump down to verse nine of chapter 10. The next day, as they went on their journey and drew near the city, Peter went up on the housetop to pray about the sixth hour.

And when he became very hungry and wanted to eat, but while they made ready, he fell into a trance and a saw. heaven opened up and an object like a great sheep bound at the four corners, descending to him and let down to the earth.

In it were all kinds of four -footed animals of the earth, wild beasts creeping things, the birds of the air. And a voice came to him, rise Peter, kill and eat. But Peter said, no, not so Lord, for I have never eaten anything common or unclaimed.

And a voice spoke to Peter again. The second time, what God has cleansed, you must not call common. This was done three times. And the object was taken up into heaven again. You remember in chapter nine, that Saul who would later become Paul had a vision.

He had a vision, God was working in his heart, knocked him off his horse. and he surrendered his life to the Lord Jesus Christ. At the same time that God was sovereignly working in the heart of Saul to bring him to salvation, God had casted a vision to a man in the temple named Ananias and God brought Saul and Ananias.

Ananias was a believer and he trusted in the Lord and he brought a saint and a sinner together to accomplish the purpose of God. We come to chapter 10 and what we see is Cornelius. He was a religious man.

He was a man, a military man, well -respected. He was a man that people looked up to. He was generous in his giving. He was faithful in his prayers, but he had never believed in the Lord Jesus Christ.

He was an outsider to the Jewish faith, but yet they respected him because he gave so generously and because of his military influence, the Bible says that he was a centurion, which means he probably oversaw a military, a band of military, a platoon of military people, perhaps of 100 or even more different scholars debate about how many might have been in this, but the bottom line is there was at least 100 men serving in this particular band of military people and he was overseeing them.

And the Bible tells us that Cornelius had a vision. God was working in his heart and at the next day, Peter. Peter, a man of God, a soul winner, a man that had trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ who stood before thousands and he preached the gospel on the day of Pentecost and many came to trust the Lord Jesus Christ, but God was working in the heart of Peter to bring a saint and a sinner together.

And I want to assure you today that God is always working together, that he is providentially using people to accomplish his purpose. And you may wonder what is going on in this crazy world that we are living in and the signs of the times that we see manifesting.

I assure you that we have a God who has not given up on us and he has not given up on his great plan of redemption and bringing people into the family of God. And that there is a sovereign plan to bring us in connection with people who do not know the Lord Jesus Christ.

He may not do it as dramatic as he did with Cornelius and Peter and Saul and Ananias, but he is using circumstances and he is using challenges in our life and he is using changes in our life and transitions in our life that we may come across the right people and be able to share the wonderful good news of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, some of you are troubled, you’re shaken at your very core. You are set back in your spiritual walk because of all that is happening. And I want to encourage you that no matter what happens in this world, politically, whatever might happen in this world, government, with government, that there is a Savior, Jesus Christ, who is sitting on a throne and he is still calling men and women, boys and girls,

into a relationship with him. And no matter what that future may look for America, you and I can rest assured that the future in the kingdom of God is as bright and hopeful as it has ever been. Can God’s people say amen?

Go ahead, you can say it. That’s true because it is the truth of God. And so what we see is the preparation of Cornelius and the preparation of Peter. God was doing a work of grace because you see, Peter really had never reached out to anybody beyond the Jewish nation.

He had never reached out to anybody beyond his own ethnicity. He had never really taken the gospel farther and now God was working in him. How does God work through us? I want you to write these three things down.

How does God prepare my heart that I might share the gospel with others? How does God prepare the hearts of sinners? First of all, I want you to know that God uses prayer. Remember that Cornelius was praying.

He was faithful in his prayers. Remember the Bible says that in the sixth hour, which is about noon, that Peter in verse 9 of chapter 10, that the Bible says that he was on the house hop to pray. And so he goes up at noontime and he is praying.

And we have these two men that are seeking God. One is seeking God with a relationship. The other is seeking God out of religion. And the Bible tells us that the angel appeared to Cornelius and said, God has heard your prayers.

It is a memorial before God. I want you to know that God hears… the prayer of seeking sinners. Your heart may be troubled, it may be broken, it may be devastated, it may be destroyed by all the things that are happening in your life, but there is a God who is watching and He hears your prayers.

He is near and dear to the broken heart of the Scripture says. We see that Peter was a man of prayer. We see that he was seeking divine guidance. We see that God was using prayer to change Peter. Let me tell you something about prayer is that so many of us, we look at prayer and we’re like, hey God, we want to tell you what’s going on as if God didn’t know.

We want to say, hey God, we just want to make sure that you know what is happening, but I assure you that we have a God who knows all things, but prayer is not so much for you to inform God as much as it is for God to inform you.

Because prayer is that moment when our hearts are humbled and surrendered before an almighty God. And where God is aligning our hearts with his heart. Where God is changing us to be more compassionate and he is changing us to be more committed and devoted to his cause and his purpose in the world.

What was God doing in the moment of prayer and the life of Peter? He was changing Peter. Because Peter was committed to the old covenant. Remember we study the book of Acts and the Bible says at the early beginning of the book of Acts that they were daily going to the temple.

What’s that tell me? That tells me that the early church that many of those Jewish believers were still, they were still stuck in that regiment of the Old Testament of going to the temple daily. They were still stuck in some of those traditions of the old covenant.

It’s not till we get to Acts 15 that the church begins to break away from some of these traditions that were being forced upon them through the Jewish faith. And so Peter is on the house top. He is praying and God is trying to help him to see that God is going to make a change.

And God is gonna change Peter to accomplish that. How does God prepare us through circumstances? He prepares us through circumstances. We see that Cornelius as well as Peter were going through some unique circumstances.

Peter was very particular. He was just hungry. He was just hungry. And what does God do? He uses that hunger and to cast a vision upon Peter so that he would see that all that God has created is claimed.

The Jewish people under the old covenant, they could only eat certain foods and they could only partake of certain animals. And so Peter being that good young Jewish man, he was not about to violate the Old Testament.

or the old covenant, but the Bible tells us in verse 15 that God said to Peter, what God has cleansed, you must not call common. The centurion Cornelius, he was a man who was seeking God and God was using even his affluence and his prestige and his accomplishments.

He was showing him that none of these things never satisfy. These things don’t fulfill the heart. These are the things that may be popular in the world, but they do not change the heart. They do not fulfill you.

There’s always that vacuum in the heart of someone who is looking and searching and they try everything that the world has to offer that they might be fulfilled only to find. They’re at a dead end road.

Cornelius was seeking God, looking for answers. God uses circumstances in all of our life. That’s why I’m telling you, you say, why is God doing this, why is God doing that? It may be that God is preparing your heart, that you might share with someone who doesn’t know Christ and he is preparing their heart so that they’ll look to him.

So many people look to their wealth, they look to the military might of a nation, or they look to the political favoritism of a government, and what they find is that none of those things will answer what the great need in their heart is.

The only answer to the heart of sin is Jesus Christ who saves us from our sins. Yeah, church, now you need to wake up, church. I know you’re struggling. It’s Sunday morning, but God is working. God often allows circumstances into our life, hear me, to address our weaknesses.

God allowed something in Peter’s life to help him see his bias, to change his prejudice that he had to those who were beyond Judaism and of the ethnicity of the Jews. I also wanna tell you that God changes us and prepares us through his word.

We said through prayer, through circumstances, through his word, it took Peter three visions from God and a word from the Spirit of God before he finally got the message, but he finally got it. God speaks to us, God sent a messenger, an angel to Cornelius.

He sent the angel with his word to Cornelius on what to do and how to meet with Peter and to find this true salvation. God used his word. He usually has a messenger who brings his word into your life.

Peter brought the message of the gospel to Cornelius who was in need of salvation, and God will speak into our lives through his word and God will open his truth to us and God will use his messengers to help share his wonderful message with us.

so that God can prepare us to do what he has called us to do. But the question is, how many times does God have to speak to you before you will respond to him? How many times does God have to bring a tragedy in your life before you will finally surrender your heart to God and do what he has called you to do?

Does God have to knock you flat on your back, put you in the hospital where you can only look up before you will finally say, Lord, I am surrendered to you? Or are you walking with the Lord and you hear his sweet gentle voice and you know when he’s speaking into your heart?

Does God have to break you down before you’ll finally obey and you’ll finally follow what his good work of preparation is in your heart? We said to you at the outset that if we’re gonna be free, from prejudice we must believe God’s sovereign preparation in our own hearts and in the hearts of others.

But number two, we must demonstrate a submissive will. I want you to come to verse 21. The Bible says, Peter went down to the men who had been sent to him from Cornelius and said, yes, I am he whom you seek.

For what reason have you come? And they said, Cornelius, the centurion, a just man, one who fears God and has a good reputation among all the nation of the Jews, was divinely instructed by a holy angel to summon you to his house and to hear words from you.

Then he invited them in. This is Peter. He lodged with them. On the next day, Peter went away with them and some brethren from Joppa accompanied him. And the following day, they entered Caesarea. Now, Cornelius was waiting for them and called together his relatives and close friends.

As Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him. He fell down at his feet and he worshiped him. But Peter lifted him up and saying, stand up, I myself also am a man. And as he talked with him, he went in and found many who had come together.

Then he said to them, and I want you to see this, you know how unlawful it is for a Jewish man to keep company with or to go to one of another nation. But God has shown me that I should not call any man common or unclean.

You see, when Peter finally heard the vision and he finally responded, he was submissive to God’s will for his life. The Lord is looking for surrendered hearts. He’s not looking for better methods and stronger people.

He’s looking for hearts that are fully surrendered. God works through people. and God will work through your life when you are surrendered to the will of God. When you say, Lord, okay, I don’t understand it, but this is what you’ve called me to do, okay, God, you want me to step out and do this.

Now, there’s two key things for me to have a consistent surrendered heart to God. I want you to write these two words down. Number one is obedience. You must be willing to obey God. You must be willing to obey God, even when it doesn’t make sense.

You know, sometimes the commands of God, why they seem odd, or maybe they seem different, but let me tell you how the economy of God works. The economy of God is not like the world, and the world says, I believe it when I see it.

But God says, believe it, and you will see it. Do you understand that? And sometimes what God says, like this Molly getting baptized? People say, well, I don’t understand why we gotta do that, pastor.

Let me tell you why. Because if you say you’re a believer and you’re not willing to obey Jesus when he tells us to get baptized, what makes you think he can trust you to obey him down the road when he needs you to do A, B, or C for him?

Obedience is your first step. Obedience and baptism is your first step of spiritual maturity and a surrendered heart to the Lord Jesus Christ. That’s why all through our journey, we are called to obey God.

Remember Abraham? Remember that God said, Abraham, pack up everything and take your family and get out. And I’ll tell you where to go later. Now, again, most of us, we would wanna budget. We wouldn’t wanna know our destination.

We would wanna know details and we’d be texting God and we’d be saying, now, God, I need to know this and I’d need to know that. But you know what God wants is obedience. He wants obedience. The second thing to help me have a surrendered, sustained, surrendered heart is faith.

It is faith. I want you to understand something the scriptures teach us in Hebrews 11 .6, without faith, it’s impossible to please him. For he that cometh to God must believe that he is and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

It is by faith that you please God. You say, my heart is submissive and surrendered, Pastor Mike. Well, then I say to you, walk by faith. The Bible does not say the just shall live by explanation. The just shall live by faith.

You trust God? The Bible teaches us in Proverbs 3, verse five and six that we’re to trust the Lord with all of our heart. Not half your heart, not a quarter of your heart, not three quarters of your heart, not even 99%.

But trust the Lord with all your heart. The Bible says, and acknowledge him in all your ways. And the Bible teaches us that he will direct. our past we are called to trust the Lord we are called to follow him by faith now there are three ways in this generation that you and I can display obedience and faith as we’re reaching out to people now listen hang on to this first of all make sure that you show no hesitation of befriending people who are unlike you you remember what Peter did he opened the door come on in and he developed a friendship with these people and he told him up front you know the Old Testament tells me that I’m not supposed to be with you I’m not to hang out with you because you people are unclean but I want to tell you that God in the new covenant through the power of the cross and the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ that he has now launched a new covenant that Christ has fulfilled all that was required and necessary in the old covenant and we live in a new covenant and in that new covenant we are called to love God and we are called to love people.

And even people, are you with me? That are unlike us. I know you have your people that you hang with. But have you ever tried to love people that are unlike you? Did you know that there are people out there?

They’re not like me and they’re not like you. But they need Jesus Christ. And unless you build a friendship with them, I’m telling you, they may never hear the gospel. You say, Pastor, this is Franklin County.

People will always even indirectly hear the gospel. How about that testimony we heard from a young lady who lived down in Green Castle before COVID. She testified to our church that she grew up in Green Castle, Franklin County, Pennsylvania and no one ever told her the gospel of Jesus Christ.

No, she went to Penn State University and there were Bible studies on that campus and somebody invited her to the Bible study and she heard the gospel for the first time. She was so overwhelmed she broke down in tears and gave her life to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Don’t assume, don’t assume that people have heard but we’re doing every available means to reach every available person but I rest assure to you that you still have a responsibility to make sure that every person that you come in contact has heard the gospel and even if they’re not like you.

So there are no second class citizens in God’s kingdom. The ground is level. at the foot of the cross. When we think about the gospel, it’s a gospel of inclusion. It’s a gospel that reaches out and invites people from all nationalities and all walks of life to repent and believe in Jesus Christ.

And that’s what the apostle Peter is learning in Acts chapter 10. And it needs to be something imprinted upon our hearts so that we don’t behave in prejudicial ways and that we are continuing to understand that there’s really only one race and that’s the human race and that God is reaching out to people and He wants us to be His instrument to help spread His truth to their hearts.

So I hope it’s been a blessing to you. I do want to mention we are not just a ministry of proclaiming the truth and studying the Bible, which we do, but we also want to pray for you. So if you have a special prayer request, go to hopeworthhaving .com.

That’s hopeworthhaving .com. and just hit that contact button and send us your prayer request. We’ll be glad to pray for you this week and whatever you’re facing, we want to certainly join you and partner with you in taking it to the Lord and seeking his wisdom.

This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.

The post How to be Free From Prejudice Part 1 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on How to Live a Transformed Life Part 2. He will be reading out of Acts 9:32-43.

All we got to do is bring them to the understanding that our hope is not in government, our hope is not in the economy, our hope is not in the stock market, our hope is not in our assets, our hope is not what we have physically and tangibly and materially and financially.

Our hope is in Jesus Christ. Hello this is Pastor Mike Sanders and this is Hope Worth Having radio program. We’re delighted to be with you today and looking forward to what God has for us as we’re going to be in the book of Acts chapter 9 and we’re studying how to be effective in your ministry.

When we look at the life of the Apostle we know that he certainly was an example of effective ministry so we’re going to look into the Word of God and see what that standard is and what it’s like to be effective for God.

So join me as we study together. I want you to come to Acts chapter 9 we’re gonna be studying verse 32 through 43 and I want to talk this morning about how to be effective in your ministry. A truth that we all need to believe every believer is called to ministry that may seem profound to you but it is basic understanding in the scriptures.

Every one of you that loves Jesus Christ and that has received Christ as your Lord and Savior you have been called to ministry. God is calling all believers to serve him. The Bible tells us in Romans chapter 12 verse 6 and 7 where the Apostle was teaching about how believers are equipped with spiritual gifts and he said having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us let us you and he refers to one of those gifts as being ministry.

Let us use it in our ministering. When we think of this word ministry in the Greek, it is the idea of serving. You’ve heard it referred to as maybe deacon, is the Greek word diakonos, and it means to serve tables.

It means to serve others in a tangible way, in a physical way. And what God is calling all of us to do is to be a minister. The church, when it gathers, is not simply a place where we just sit and we learn and then we leave.

Too many believers look at that’s the scope of their faith. They come on Sunday, they sit in the pew, they learn a few things from the pastor, and they go home, never. ever thinking about what has God called me to do and what am I to do with what I have learned?

But I wanna remind you in Ephesians 2 .10 that the Bible says we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works which God has before ordained that we should walk in them. You are his workmanship.

That is the idea of a masterpiece, an artistic painting in that God is painting a beautiful picture on the canvas of your life. And as you and I respond to him, what he has already preordained in our life, what he has already purposed in our life, what he has already called us to do, he is saying, walk in that plan, walk in that purpose.

God has gifted every believer. God has gifted every person that loves the Lord Jesus Christ. He has gifted you that you might serve him. Now the Lord has called us to believe. He’s called us to believe on him for salvation.

He has also called us to belong. He has called us to belong to a local church family where we have the opportunity to be able to grow and to be nurtured, strengthened, cared for and to be able to be held accountable that we might be all that God wants us to be.

But I want you to understand the Christian life is more than believing and it’s more than just belonging for you have been called to minister. You have been called to serve. And specifically, at the outset of your ministry, you are called to serve each other as believers.

And we need to understand that we need each other. You know, some people say, well, I don’t need to go to church. Well friends, here’s the thing. You’re misunderstanding what it’s all about. First, as I told you a few weeks ago, I need to come to church because not because I’m perfect, because I figured everything out, but I come to church because I need Jesus Christ, because I’m broken, because I realize that I need to come to a place where there’s healing and there’s hope and there’s help.

I need to come to a place where the grace of God is being poured out upon me. I need to come to a place to be with the believers where I can receive the ministry of the believers, that I can enjoy the blessings of being engaged with God’s people.

And I can’t take time to break all that down for you, but rest assured, the people that say I don’t wanna go to church, or the people that say I’m gonna stay out of church are only arrogantly saying I don’t need God this week.

How about that one? That’s right, that’s right. You say, well, Mike, I can go out on the lake and I can worship God. Who said you couldn’t? Did you ever think that I was up here teaching that there’s only one place to worship God?

Did you think that? I’m not here because it’s the only place to worship God. I am here because we are called to come together and we are called to minister to each other. Now here’s the deal. If I’m called to minister to you and you’re called to minister to me and I’m not here to minister to you, you miss out.

And if I’m not here to minister, then I miss out. You’re not here, I’m not here, we all stay home. And let me tell you something, you can’t reach your full potential in Christ without being in community with God’s people.

It’s just an impossibility. You can’t maximize your potential for Christ and be all that God wants you to be. Now look, I understand some people are coasting. All they wanna do is coast into heaven, just make it by the skin of my teeth and praise the Lord, I’m here.

But for me, I just gotta be honest with you. I’m an all in guy. I’m all in for Jesus, 100%, not up here bragging. I’m not up here trying to be pious or somehow try to think I’m better than you because that’s not the truth.

The ground is level at the foot of the cross, but I don’t jump into anything halfway. We’re either all in or we’re not. And that’s the way I am as a believer and as a follower, been that way ever since I came to Christ.

And I just want you to know that there has to come to that moment in your life that you recognize it’s not just a duty, not just a command, but that there’s actually a ministry that God has for me when I come together with the believers.

That God wants me to serve others. He wants me to be a blessing to others. And that when I come to the family of God, that I am here to minister to you and you are here to minister to me. Have you ever considered that?

That God has called you to minister to other people and certainly in the household of faith. Now we come to Acts chapter nine and we have been learning as we’ve been tracking through Acts chapter nine, that really the book of Acts is.

is about God revealing to us the acts of the apostle and what they did for Christ as they were carrying on his work and they were carrying on his mission and they were carrying on his cause throughout the world.

The outline of the book of Acts is found in Acts 1 .8. That is that they are to take this gospel, they’re to take this good news onto Jerusalem, Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth. And as we have been watching how the church was under in chapter four and chapter five under persecution and the Bible says that that led to the scattering of the church and they spread out everywhere that they could go and then in chapter seven,

we are featured the ministry of Stephen as he is stoned to death for preaching the gospel to the people in Jerusalem and this would lead to greater scattering of God’s people and then in chapter eight, we’re introduced to the ministry of Philip.

who is sent to witness to the gospel. We see that Philip is going to different towns and different cities and he is ministering to people and then the Holy Spirit spoke to Philip and said, leave the crowd and go minister to this man, this one person in a chariot.

And there Philip left the crowd and he went and ministered to this one person and that person, the Ethiopian, he came to Christ, he became a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. Last week we learned about Saul.

Saul was a antagonizer of the church, a persecutor of the church. Go back to verse one of chapter nine, then Saul still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord. He was a person who was persecuting the church, but you and I witnessed in those beginning verses of Acts chapter nine, how Saul came to know the Lord Jesus Christ as his savior.

Today we pick up in verse 32. And now the focus goes from Saul to back to Peter, this great leader in the church, this man who is serving and he stands as an example for us on how to effectively minister wherever you may be, wherever God has called you because Peter’s ministry was one of great power and effectiveness.

Want you to pick up with me in verse 32, the Bible says now it came to pass as Peter went through all parts of the country, that he also came down to the saints who dwelt in litter. There he found a certain man who had been bedridden eight years and was paralyzed.

And Peter said to him, Jesus the Christ heals you, arise and make your bed. And then he arose immediately. Look at verse 35. So all who dwelt in litter and Sharon saw him. That is, they saw the ministry of Peter.

And what did they do? They turned to the Lord. Let me give you some things real quickly that talk about how to be effective in my ministry. You might say, Pastor Mike, I don’t have ministry. Let me ask you something.

Do you have a family? Do you have people that you come in contact with? Are you in the church that you have ministry? It’s not that you don’t have ministries that you need to activate it. You need to get engaged.

You need to get involved. And you do remember that if you’re a mom and dad today, your first ministry is to your children. If you’re a grandparent today, your first ministry is to your grandchildren.

But don’t ever think that you don’t have ministry. When Terry and I were raising our three children, we always felt that that was our first mission field. And we felt that not only when they came to Christ, our job was not only to help them to know and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, but it was our job to disciple.

them to become strong believers, fully engaged in the gospel, fully engaged in the church family, committed to the Lord Jesus Christ. This is what I’m saying to you. This is your task before you. If you say, I don’t have a ministry, which I know you do, but just look around, right around you, there are people that God has placed in your life and you do have ministry.

So how do I become effective in that ministry, Pastor? Number one, be aware of people’s needs. I want you to see in the life of Peter that as he is traveling, the Bible says in verse 32 that Peter went through all parts of the country and he came down to the saints who dwelt in Liddah.

And then we find later that he is in Sharon. And then we see in verse 36 that he’s in Joppa. So Peter, he was ministering everywhere that he went, you see the gospel is reaching new areas. You jump back to chapter eight and verse 40, remember Philip, Philip was found at Azatas and passing through, he preached in all the cities till he came to Caesarea.

And here’s the point, everywhere the disciples went, everywhere that the apostles went, everywhere that the people went, they were ministering and they were aware of the people’s needs. You see friends, I want you to know that there are needs everywhere you go.

I want you to understand that you don’t have to think that you know what, there’s no needs because there’s needs everywhere. Why are there needs? Because we live in a simple world. We live in a selfish world.

We live in a world where people’s lives are messed up. Sometimes it’s their own fault, sometimes it’s not their fault. But here’s the point, they’re looking, they’re looking for help. And that’s why everywhere God puts you, every place that God puts you, every family that God puts you in, every work spot that God has for you, there is a job for you to do.

Because there’s not one person. who is unimportant to the Lord Jesus Christ. You see, I want you to see something. This is profound what Luke is doing under the inspiration of the Spirit of God. As you are walking through and you are witnessing going chapter to chapter and you are seeing the spreading of the gospel, you’re seeing the disciples taking it to Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth,

there is an undercurrent that is taking place. What is this undercurrent? It is that God is showing. Not only his disciples, but he is showing all of us who would read this later that there’s not one person that is not important to God.

You see, in this culture that Peter is ministering in, women were devalued as only being property. The Samaritans were considered unclean and that they were to be avoided and that they were not to be interacted with.

Gentiles were considered outside of the salvation of God, and the sick were considered left to themselves, but it is the gospel of Jesus Christ that Luke keeps bringing up as the physician, as he shows that Peter and Philip are ministering to people who doesn’t matter what walk of life, what their education is, what they might be experiencing, and what they might be facing in their life, that they’re all important to the Lord Jesus Christ.

That’s why I’m trying to say to you is that you need to be aware of people’s needs because people matter to God. Every person on this planet is important to God, and that God wants to use your life to minister to them.

For you to be effective, you need to be aware of this. How do I do that first? Notice the hurting. There are hurting people everywhere you go. So how do I do that? I gotta focus on others. I can’t get up and say, it’s all about me today.

You know what, I gotta get up every day and say, Lord, who can I minister to? Lord, help me to be aware and alert to my opportunities to minister to somebody else. You see, some of you are going through some challenges in life.

You’re going through some rough patches in your life. You’re facing some difficult situations. Here’s the key to your healing. The key to your healing is not to become self -focused and have a pity party.

The key to your healing is to jump out of yourself and focus on others and let God use your hurt and use your pain and use your problem and use your challenges as a platform to share the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.

To have spiritual conversations, to encourage people to turn their lives over to the Lord and to recognize that God is at work in every life and that even you as a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ, even you as a person who might be facing some trials in your life that God could use those trials, that you could not only encourage other people, but that you could help others to find and know the Lord Jesus Christ.

So how can I be aware of people’s need is by focusing on others, looking outward, rather than always focused on my problems and my pain and what I’m dealing with. But invert that and say, Lord, how do you want to use this so I can reach other people?

Another way to be aware of people’s needs is always looking for opportunities. I mean, when you go into your day, say, Lord, don’t say, why me, Lord? But say, Lord, what are you up to here? What are you up to here, Lord?

There’s something going on. You’re trying to put people in my path so I can reach them for the Lord Jesus Christ. Look for opportunities because God has wonderful opportunities for you each and every day.

But you must be prepared to take advantage of those opportunities when they come. I also want to encourage you to reach out to the hopeless. You see, there are so many people. You look at this man in verse 33.

Would you note again that he was bedridden for eight years? He was paralyzed for eight years? For eight years, it was well known in the community when Peter showed up, people probably told Peter about this guy.

Peter was probably wanting to know who are the people that are hopeless? Who are the people that are struggling? Peter walks into this community and he doesn’t want to meet with the high and affluent.

He doesn’t want to meet with the religious. He doesn’t want to meet with the most educated. He wants to find the people that are hurting and hopeless. And he says, I want to go meet with them. Shows up at this guy’s place, wherever he is, and he does great ministry to him.

What Luke records for us in verse 34 is that Peter said to him, Jesus the Christ heals you, arise and make your bed. And then he arose immediately. Remember that the Bible is like a photo album. Now I know in the old days, we used to have physical photo albums.

How many of you still have a physical photo album? You haven’t looked at it for 10, 12 years, right? Maybe 20, I don’t know. But see, now they have these photo albums on your phone. Isn’t that nice? And you can share it with your family and it digitally lives forever and ever.

And so here you have these beautiful photos, but you know a photo doesn’t capture every detail, does it? But it gives you a summation of what happened. That’s what’s happening when we’re looking at Peter’s ministry.

We’re seeing the summation of what is happening. Sometimes we have to be led of the spirit to see and understand between the lines. And you don’t have to be brilliant. You just gotta have common sense.

Peter showed up at this guy’s place and he ministered to him. And at the conclusion of his ministry to him, he said, Jesus, the Christ heals you. Arise, make your bed, then he arose immediately. So all of that, verse 35, who dwelt at Lydda and Sharon saw him, saw the ministry of Peter and they turned to the Lord.

The gospel of Jesus Christ rests in the hope of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ comes to bring hope to all. I know some of you are, worried about all the problems that are going on in this country, all the things that are happening in this world, but let me tell you something.

I see it as an opportunity because when the darkness is at its greatest, that is that the light will shine its brightest. This is an opportunity for us to have spiritual conversations, to communicate, to interact with people, and as they’re trying to express their frustrations, all we gotta do is bring them to the understanding that our hope is not in government, our hope is not in the economy, our hope is not in the stock market,

our hope is not in our assets, our hope is in not what we have physically, and tangibly, and materially, and financially, our hope is in Jesus Christ. Do you believe that? If you believe that message, friend, that I want you to walk out of this place today and take that hope to every person God puts in your path, we’re learning how to be effective by being aware of people’s needs.

That’s all Peter did. But the second thing we’ll note about how Peter was effective is that… He was always exalting Christ. Be Christ exalting. We back up and we again look at verse 34. Peter said to him, Jesus the Christ healed you.

Wasn’t Peter who healed him? But it was Jesus the Christ heals you. The Bible teaches us for other foundation can no man lay than that is laid which is Jesus Christ. The foundation of your salvation is Jesus Christ.

You can’t be saved any other way but by Christ the Bible tells us that Jesus proclaimed, I am the way, the truth and the life and no man comes to the Father except by me. You cannot be saved by any other way except through the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Bible says for by grace are you saved through faith that not of yourselves. It is a gift of God not of works lest any man should boast. You cannot work your way to heaven. You can’t be good enough to go to heaven because you would always fall miserably short.

That’s what it means to sin. The Bible tells us that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. We all fall short. There is nobody perfect but praise the Lord, Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins.

He paid the price for our sins and when we come to Christ by faith that he blesses us with eternal life. The foundation of your salvation is Jesus Christ. Now hang on. The foundation of your ministry is Jesus.

The foundation of Peter’s ministry was Jesus Christ. And you’ll note that we see in the Gospel of Luke and in the Gospel of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John is that they’re constantly lifting up Christ. And here Luke in the book of Acts as he is documenting through the power of the Spirit of God, through the inspiration of the Spirit of God, he is documenting the ministry of the apostle Peter.

He notes that he always exalted Christ. He exalted. We go back to chapter two and verse 36. We see that Peter refers to him as the righteous and the holy one. We jump over to chapter three. He is referred to as the Son of God, meaning Jesus Christ.

And then we come to chapter nine. He is referred to as the Messiah. And here, Peter says, Jesus the Christ. Jesus the Christ, even Philip preached Christ. In the synagogues, Saul, Saul, that Christ was lifted up.

It convicted his heart and drew him to Christ. What I wanna say this, Jesus made a promise to us. If I be lifted up, I will draw all men unto me. How about that? If I be lifted up, you see what he means is this, is Christ is saying is that if I am lifted up, that I will draw all kinds of people from all walks of life, from all nationalities, from all people groups, I will draw them all to me.

They will come and they will believe. Does that mean every person will believe in the Lord Jesus Christ? And that’s not what he’s trying to say. He is saying from all walks of life, people will come and receive the Lord Jesus Christ if I be lifted up.

Now friends, how can you be effective in your ministry? Lift up Jesus. Lift up Jesus Christ. Always exalt him. Don’t lift up you. Don’t lift up what you’ve accomplished. Always lift up the person of Christ because our ministry is nothing without Jesus.

The Bible teaches us that Jesus proclaimed you can do nothing without me. You say, well, look at my skills. Look at my abilities. Look at me. Look how great I am. I wanna tell you friends, anything that is accomplished in you, through you and around you is because of Jesus Christ.

It is his good work in you. He deserves all the credit. He deserves all the glory. And so if we wanna be effective in ministry, we must exalt him and we exalt him by exalting his person, exalting his power.

It was the power of God that raised up this man who for eight years was bedridden. Eight years he was paralyzed. It was the power of God. And I want you to recognize that God has wired you. He has designed you.

He has called you to a task and you can do whatever God has called you to do by his power and through his grace. Now some of you, you got the I can’t attitude. I can’t do this. Well, first of all, I tell people the Bible teaches us that we can do all things through Christ, amen.

Now I used to coach basketball. God helped those little girls who I used to coach and those middle school girls would say to me, I would show them how to do a layup and they’d look me right square. in the face and they’d say, coach, I can’t do that.

And I said, first of all, if you’re gonna be on this team, there ain’t gonna be no, I can’t. Like, you just need to go into your dictionary and I know people don’t have dictionaries anymore, but see, all my illustrations are being thrown out the window by technology, okay?

But in the old days, we had these books called dictionaries and we would cut out the word can’t because it doesn’t belong, because, you know, Jesus said I can do all things. But then I would tell the girls that they had to do a book report on the little train that could.

You guys remember the story of the little train that could? The few of us left, okay. Now you young people, if you don’t know that, you just go out there and Google that and you’ll find it somewhere on YouTube or somewhere.

But here’s the thing is this, we can. We can be a minister for God. We can minister in His power. We can minister in His grace. Who’d have ever thought? that maybe something, some of you look at your life and say, man, I would never be where I’m at without the power of God, amen.

If it were not for the power of God, we could not achieve anything effectively for God, but when we rest in his power, when we rest in his strength, then he will always meet the need. But I also want you and your Christ exalting to exalt his person, his power, but his purpose, his purpose.

We come down and I want you to see in verse 35 real quick. So all who dwelt at Lydda and Charon saw him and they turned to the Lord. Friends, do you know why God sent Peter to these towns so that people would be saved?

Do you know why God raised this man who had been paralyzed for eight years to be able to walk so people would be saved? I want you to remember that as we are witnessing here, they turn to the Lord. It is a reference to turning away from sin, that they are turning away from sin and they are turning to the Lord Jesus Christ.

What is the purpose of God? The divine purpose of God is that people would know the Lord Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. The Bible says he is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to what church?

Repentance. What does the word repentance mean? Oh, you think it’s some big biblical word that you’ve learned in Bible college. I’m telling you the word repentance means to turn around. It means to be going one direction, stop in your tracks, turn around and go the other direction.

What happened to these people when they saw the power of God and they saw the person of Christ lifted up, that I want you to know that the purpose of God was fulfilled in their life in that they turned from their sin and they received Jesus Christ as their Savior and they turned to the Lord and they followed him as well.

true disciple. I wonder how many people would come to Christ if you would rest in the power of God and you would exalt the person of Christ. How many people would be coming to Jesus Christ? The church is God’s platform for His glory.

The church is God’s vehicle to promote and share the gospel. I hope that as you’re learning about ministry sometimes we look at other churches and say that’s the standard for effectiveness and maybe sometimes we even look to the world but really we ought to look to the Word of God and we ought to look at the ministry of the Apostle Paul and what is it that is truly effective for God and I hope that these principles that have been shared will continue to happen.

help each of us to not only individually have effective ministry, but also corporately in our local churches. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.

The post How to be Effective in Your Ministry Part 1 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on How to Live a Transformed Life Part 2. He will be reading out of Acts 9:1-31.

Those who claim that hypocrites only seem to show up at the church, and therefore that gives them the excuse not to come and be with the family of God, I notice nobody saying to me, hey, I’m going to quit going to the grocery store, because there’s a bunch of hypocrites walking up and down those aisles.

Hello, and welcome to Hope Worth Having radio program. This is Mike Sanders, senior pastor of the Open Door Church, and grateful to have this opportunity to share God’s word with you. Today we’re going to be in Acts chapter 9.

We’re continuing the study of the life of the conversion of the Apostle Paul as he shares this great testimony. We learn what it really means to live a transformed life. And I hope that as you and I study this, that this will continue to compel us to strive to be more like Jesus Christ.

So let’s get into our study today. Prayer is not just a religious duty. It’s not just something that we do because we feel compelled to do is to keep God happy. But rather, part of our transformation is that as we are praying, God is changing us.

People say to me, why should I pray, Pastor? Well, I want you to know not only should you pray because God works through prayer, and God has chosen to bless through prayer, and that God in his sovereign will always accomplishes eternal works through the prayers of his people.

And I want you to know that we should pray because prayer blesses others, and God calls us to pray. But did you know that you should pray because God will change you as you are praying? Now, so many people see prayer as for somebody else, or prayer as praying for a particular circumstance or situation, rightly so.

But prayer goes deeper, and prayer goes further. You wanna be that person of God? You wanna be that person who honors God in your life that be fervent in your prayers. Because through prayer, God is humbling your heart.

Through prayer, God is shaping your heart. Through prayer, God is molding you into the image of Christ and He is bringing us in alignment to His will. You remember our Lord and Savior in the Garden of Gethsemane that as He was preparing Himself to be crucified on the cross that was imminent upon Him, that He had invited the disciples to come into the Garden of Gethsemane to pray with Him.

He finds that as He looks back that they’re sleeping. How would you feel calling on people to pray and partner with you? And when you look, you find them sleeping. You find them sleeping. The weight of the sins of the world.

approaching the savior of Jesus Christ, that the immense responsibility of paying for the sins of mankind upon our savior, and just the emotional task, the physical task that was before him, the Bible says that he was sweating great drops of blood.

The stress, the immensity of it weighing upon his mind and his heart was right there, but what does he do? He calls out upon God and he says, Lord, if it’s possible, allow this cup to pass from me. What cup?

The cup of suffering, the cup of sacrifice. He calls out to the Father, if it’s possible, let the cup of suffering pass from me. But he says, Lord, not my will, your will. What is God doing in prayer?

He is aligning your heart with his heart. For we are taught by Jesus Christ himself in the Lord’s prayer that we are to pray, Lord, not my will, but your will. We are taught that we are to pray for God’s will to be done on earth as it is in, thank you.

And this is the alignment of prayer that God is doing in your life. Those who neglect prayer in their life are not only powerless and they are not seeing the eternal work of God in the hearts of their own children and their own lives and their people that are around them, but their hearts are not even aligned with the will of God.

You wanna live a transformed life in this world, you wanna make a difference, you wanna impact your family, you wanna impact your children. I cannot stress enough to you that you need to be a person who is fervent in prayer.

The third thing I want you to see is that we are called to be faithful in service. Look at verse 13. of chapter nine, the Bible said, Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard him, I have heard from many about this man, how much harm he has done to your saints in Jerusalem, and here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call on your name.

Have you ever been there? And Ananias, he was a faithful man of God, he was doing the work of Christ, and God revealed to him in a vision that he was to go to Saul, and that he was to lay his hands upon him, that Saul might receive his sights.

And Ananias is like, wait a minute, Lord, I think, A, you got the wrong man, and B, I think you don’t know who Saul is. And you and I have been there, we have said, Lord, we think that you don’t fully understand.

We have thought, you know what, Lord, maybe. this is not what you clearly see, what is going on here. And so here he tells the Lord, he wants to straighten him out, verse 14 says, and here he has authority from the chief priest to bind all who call on your name.

Lord, that puts me in the fire and lane. But look at the response in verse 15. The Lord said to him, go, for he is a chosen vessel of mine to bear my name before Gentiles, kings, and the children of Israel, for I will show him how many things he must suffer for my name’s sake, verse 17.

And Ananias went his way and entered the house and laying his hands on him, he said, brother, Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road as you came has sent me that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.

What are the keys to being faithful in service? First, there is a calling that God has upon us. I want to remind every one of you that every believer is called to be a minister. Every believer is called to some ministry.

You say, I wanna make a difference, then listen, you have to live a life of ministry, a life of service. You can’t wake up every day and say, I wanna live for self. You can’t wake up every day and say, I want it all to be about me.

Friends, you’ll never make any impact upon others, but when you get up in the day and say, Lord, here I am, send me, send me to that person, send me to that situation. I want to be a blessing, I want to serve you, I want to help others, I want to make a difference.

You see, there’s a call that is upon all of us. Maybe you’re not getting a vision and maybe you’re not hearing a voice and you wonder, God, do you wanna use me? I tell you that he does. that this call is upon each and every heart that has committed their lives to the Lord Jesus Christ.

There was not only the call to service, but there was the understanding of the cost of serving God. Did you see that in verse 16? God said to Ananias, I will show him how many things he must suffer for my name’s sake.

I want you to know that when you serve God, it won’t be easy. I want you to know that serving God is messy. And why is it messy? Because people are messy and lives are a mess and there are imperfect people that live in this world and you get frustrated and you want everything to be perfect and you want everything to come together and you just want everything to be so wonderful.

But I tell you that when you serve God, you have to get your hands dirty. When you serve God, you have to be willing to humble your heart. When you serve God, I want you to know that sometimes people will misunderstand you.

They will misunderstand your motives, and they’ll misunderstand what you’re trying to do to help them. When you serve God, you’re gonna get some pushback. When you serve God, even your own family might think that you’re a little weird.

Why? Because every day, through all the different media platforms that are out there, they’re told to glorify self. They’re told to live for self. They are told to make it about them. All you gotta do is listen to how people talk.

I listen to people talk, and it’s always about them. It’s about how they can one -up your story. But when was the last time that you heard somebody who was really interested in you, who was interested in what you are dealing with, and they’re asking questions about your circumstances, the heart is revealed in how you listen to others.

And sometimes the best way we can serve is being a listener, right? Sometimes the best way we serve is praying for others. Sometimes we serve by jumping in and getting a task done. Sometimes we serve by being an encourager.

Sometimes we serve by filling a need. However God has called you to serve, every believer is a minister, but there is a cost to that service. And we must remember, and what we see in verse 17 is that he is commissioned by God.

I want you to know that you are commissioned by God. You don’t have to wait for Pastor Mike to lay hands on you and grab you by the neck and say, get busy for Jesus. No, you don’t have to wait for that.

The Spirit of God is residing in you, the hand of God is upon you, and you are ready. Some of you say, well, I need to take a few more classes, Pastor Mike. Can you come up with any more classes? Well, friends, we can come up with all the education, all the classes, but you know what I found?

Sometimes you just need to jump in and get her done. That’s what you need to do. You need to get out there and make it happen. I’m rejoicing that so many are coming back to the house of the Lord, that they’re coming back to worship God.

But here’s my biggest disappointment. Are you putting your seatbelts on church? Because I’m talking to you. You know, one time a man asked me, he said, I feel like that when you’re up there preaching, that you’re preaching at me.

And I said, duh, okay. Now, if you think I just got up here to just talk to the wind and the walls, then you’re crazy. You’re crazy. I’m not picking on you. The Spirit of God is speaking to you. But here’s what I wanna say to you, church.

The biggest disappointment is that God’s people have not reactivated in serving. So many just coming, sitting, and soaking, saying, I’m not gonna help out in the nursery. I’m not gonna help out in children’s ministry.

Pastor, we want all these programs. We want all these activities for our young people. We want these things to happen, but Pastor, you do it all. Hey, listen, I’ve learned that one person cannot do it all.

It takes teamwork to make the dream work, amen? And so it’s gonna take all of us finding our place. If you’re just a sitter and you’re just a soaker, let me tell you what’s gonna happen in your Christian life.

You’re gonna be sour, a sour Christian, because you’re gonna be like that person who stands on the sidelines or up in the stands at a football game or a baseball game or a soccer game. You’re complaining about everything.

You’re complaining about the coach. You’re complaining about the refs. You’re complaining about the athletes. You’re complaining about everything while you’re sucking down a hot dog and a 20 -ounce Mountain Dew.

As if they’re the problem and you’re not. My friends, I wanna be kind. Get off your tail, get in the game, and let’s make a difference for the Lord Jesus Christ. It’d be good that we didn’t maybe eat so many hot dogs, huh?

But I want us to get active for Jesus Christ, and I wanna encourage you that if you wanna live a transformed life, you gotta not only sit and soak, but you gotta serve. And when you serve Jesus Christ, you’ll be a sweet Christian, and you’ll be the kind of Christian that is refreshing people, renewing people, encouraging people.

Now I know what some of you say, well, Pastor Mike, I did my time. I did my time. Friends, I want you to know that maybe we can’t do what we used to could do because of maybe… It may be our physical limitations, but I tell you that all of us should find a place where we can serve Jesus Christ and keep helping the gospel of Jesus Christ to go forward.

Amen? Now let me tell you a fourth way for us to live a transformed life, and that is to be filled with the spirit. Look at verse 17. At the end of the verse, as he said, brother Saul the Lord Jesus appeared to you on the road as you came and he sent me that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.

That’s the key. It is the Spirit of God that empowers us to do God’s work. It is a divine empowerment that he gives us. The Spirit of God is effectively working in us, but yet we do not tap into all that the Spirit has for us.

So many times we neglect full surrender and yielding to the Spirit of God, but God wants us to be. some of you might feel like you need more of the spirit, but I’m here to tell you, you got all the spirit that you need.

You just need to allow the spirit to have more of you. You need to be more surrendered every day. You say, how do you stay motivated for the Lord Jesus Christ? How do you keep going at it, Pastor Mike?

I tell you that it is through the power of the Spirit of God. Jesus said, without me, you can do nothing. Some of you, it doesn’t take long, for you’re gonna quit, get discouraged, be defeated, and ready to throw in the towel.

Hey friends, following Jesus Christ is not gonna be easy. Nobody said that it was a bed of roses, and so we are called to be a people who are firm, courageous, and we are ready to move forward for the Lord Jesus Christ, and that it is too soon to quit, and that we understand that we will reap in due time, if we will just stay faithful for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Let me tell you something else about the filling of the Spirit in your life. It not only empowers you to do God’s work, but it’ll eliminate undesirable characteristics in your life. That’s the work of the Spirit.

You see, Saul was a new man in Christ. He was a new person in Christ. It was the Spirit of God who began to point out things that he needs to change in his life. Some people come to church, and they hear the word of God, and the Spirit of God speaks to them, and they say, well, that’s for somebody else.

Well, I’m glad Pastor Mike said that for that person over there, but you know what? Spirit of God’s speaking to you. Is there anything God is saying I need you to get that out of your life so you can be a better servant for me?

Is there anything I need you to change in your life? Every day when I read my Bible, I am always asking this question to the Lord as I’m praying. Lord, is there anything you want me to change? In my heart.

Is there anything… that you want me to confess to you and make right with you. When you come to God’s word and you have a heart that is ready to receive from the Lord and that you are willing like Saul, Lord, what do you want me to do?

Lord, what do you want me to change? Lord, what do you want me to confess to you? That’s when God can use your life. So many people are not teachable. They’re proud, resistant, even now some. You have that wall up and you have it nice and high so that the spirit of God could never speak to your heart.

You go through the motions, you do the religious thing, you walk out of here and you’re the same person when you came in. There’s something wrong with that. I want to walk out of here different. I want to open my Bible and be a better Christian, be a better husband, be a better father, be a better grandfather.

I wanna walk outta here and be that person that God is calling to me. I’m okay if there’s a little conviction. I’m okay if the Spirit of God is saying, hey Mike, work in this area. I’m okay, as the old timers used to say, if the preacher steps on my toes.

Just not my ingrown toe now, amen. I’m just teasing you, trying to keep you awake. I’m almost done. So hang in there, okay? The fifth, now there’s seven points and I’m flying through them fast, okay?

But we gotta get through this. The fifth characteristic of a transformed life is fellowship with the saints. Look at verse 18. Immediately there fell from his eyes something like scales. This is Saul.

He arose, received his sight at once and he arose and was baptized. And so when he received food, he was strengthened. And then Saul spent some days with the disciples at Damascus. I was telling our teachers just this week that it’s important for them to stay connected with one another.

It’s important for you to stay connected with your church, your family. It’s important for you to stay connected to believers because you are more powerful together than you are alone. And I want you to remember this.

When you are tempted by the devil, you cannot grow spiritually in isolation. You just can’t reach your optimum for God in isolation. God wants you to fellowship with the saints. He wants you to be connected with the believers.

He wants you to be a part of the family of God. Now, many people say to me, Pastor Mike, I don’t have to go to church. I can worship God anywhere. I can worship him on the lake. I can worship him in the trees.

I can worship him anywhere. Who said you couldn’t? I never said that. I don’t know that it’s taught anywhere in the Bible. The Bible says the heavens declare his glory, amen. and I’m telling you, all of creation is from God, and when I look at the mountains and I see the beauty of the forest and I see God’s handiwork all around us, certainly my heart lifts up to God Almighty in praise, but who said that you couldn’t worship God anywhere and everywhere?

That’s not the point, that’s not the point. That’d be like a player saying, hey, I can throw a baseball by myself, I can throw a football by myself, well, who said you couldn’t? But you know what? There’s something better about together.

There’s something about making a difference about being together. You not only can worship God while you’re fishing, but you can worship God in the house of God, and you can love the Lord Jesus Christ when you are with the family of God.

And I want you to know that you say, I wanna be that Christian, I wanna be that transformative person, I wanna be that… The person who makes a difference in others, it’ll only happen in the context.

Are you with me? Of relationships with God’s people. It won’t happen any other way. I don’t know of any great Christian. I don’t know of any Christian that’s making a difference that lives in isolation, apart from the family of God.

So I encourage you, know this, the Bible says in 1 John 3, 14, we know that we’ve passed from death to life because we love the brethren. He who does not love his brother abides in death. People say, well Mike, there’s a bunch of hypocrites at that church, a bunch of hypocrites.

Well come join us, come join us. Are you saying that somehow you’re not a hypocrite? Is that what you’re telling us? As you are judging us and calling us all hypocrites, are you saying that you’re not?

Is that what you’re saying? I noted that those who claim that hypocrites only seem to show up at the church, and therefore that gives them the excuse not to come and be with the family of God. I notice that they didn’t quit going to the grocery store.

Did you know hypocrites are everywhere? They show up at the grocery store, they show up at the restaurants, they show up at the gas station, they’re everywhere. But nobody’s saying to me, hey, I’m gonna quit going to the grocery store because there’s a bunch of hypocrites walking up and down those aisles.

Hey, let me ask you, where should the hypocrites be? Where do you want them to be? I want them to be under the sound of God’s word, amen. Hey, did you think this place was a museum? Did you know this is a hospital?

We don’t come and gather together because we’re perfect, because we somehow want to proclaim, we got it all together. We come here every time you walk through the doors and this might clean out. out some of you, but every time you walk through the doors, did you know what you’re saying?

I’m broken. I need grace. I need help. I need encouragement. When you walk through the doors, you are indirectly proclaiming your need for God and your need for grace and your need for his peace and your need for his power and his strength.

Friends, we’re not here claiming that we got it all together. We’re here saying, hey, just like you, we need Jesus. Amen. I mean, I was in the ER a while back and I looked around people having all kinds of issues.

And I didn’t get up and say, you know what? I’m not going to the ER anymore because a bunch of hypocrites appear. And I didn’t say, hey, you know what? Those people, they got brokenness. I don’t wanna be around a bunch of people with brokenness.

And you say, well, everybody’s a hypocrite. your self -judging attitude and self -righteousness is your brokenness. My brokenness may be another area, and your brokenness is that you think you’re better than everybody.

And your brokenness is that you judge everybody and rather than trying to help the hypocrite to become a genuine, authentic follower of Christ, your brokenness is that you’re looking down on people. Some of our brokenness is we already know our life is a mess.

And we’re looking up to the Savior and saying, Lord, I’m here because without you, I can do nothing. Our sixth characteristic of a transformed life is fervency and speaking. I won’t spend a lot of time, but verses 20 through 22, we find that Saul was immediately proclaiming Christ.

He was immediately preaching the gospel. He was immediately teaching the Bible. He was immediately telling others about Christ, which only helps us to understand the importance of being a witness. Helps us to understand that Christ’s mission is our mission.

John 17, verse 18 says, as thou has sent me, Jesus said, referring to the Father, as you have sent me, Father, into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world. His mission is my mission.

My last point is that we are fearless in suffering. In verses 23 through 31, you could spend some time reviewing it this afternoon or evening. But here, Saul is dealing with the reality that one day he not only is going to suffer, but he deals with the reality that there is a plot against Saul in verse 24 to kill him.

And he was facing suffering. He was facing threats. He was facing humiliating treatment. And I want you to know that perhaps… serving Christ does mean that we take up our cross. Jesus said, if you wanna be my disciple, you have to deny self and take up your cross.

Your cross is not my cross, but all of us bear a cross. It is the cross of sacrifice. It is the cross of suffering. But you must be fearless as you stand for God. What we need today are courageous disciples who are not afraid to suffer for the cause of Jesus.

What we need today is people to look at our lives and say that our convictions and our principles and our values are firm. And though all the world is pressuring us on the outside to change our value system, and they are trying to convince us that we’re the wackos.

and that there’s something weird about us, let us be assured that as we are in God’s word and we are walking by faith, that we are the ones who are called to be the light in the darkness, and that this is not a time church to shrink back, and this is not a time to be fearful, and this is not a time to be ashamed believing in the Lord Jesus Christ.

When a country, when a nation, when a people reject God, I’m telling you the Bible tells us that God will get out of our way. You’re not gonna like what I’m saying, and you’re gonna get mad, and you’re gonna send me wonderful emails, but I’m just gonna delete them.

Because what I’m getting ready to say is gonna upset you, and that’s this. If you wanna be stupid, I said it, God’ll get out of your way. He will get out of your way, read Romans chapter one. This nation wants to be stupid and throw away common sense and what is right and what is honoring the God, then God will get out of her way.

But for the people of God, for the family of God, we will stand up if we’re the last voice on this earth. If we are the last people who love this country and who love the freedom that we have, if we are the last people on this earth, we are gonna go down fighting, but we are not quitting, and we are not giving up.

We are gonna be fearless for the Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So church, let us commit our hearts to living a transformed life, not being ashamed of what we know is right and honorable to God.

Thank you. We’ve covered all the characteristics of a life that is transformed, and there’s certainly a lot for all of us to work on, and it doesn’t matter who we are, we’re always working to be more like Jesus.

God did a dramatic change in the life of the Apostle Paul, and he does that to those who believe in Jesus Christ. And as we strive to be like Jesus, we must remember that God is calling us to live a transformed life in a world that is constantly compromising.

But I hope you are encouraged and strengthened in your faith. We want to encourage you to check out our website, HopeWorthHaving .com. That’s HopeWorthHaving .com. There’s a lot of resources there, and you can tap into those resources and be an encouragement to your faith.

So check us out on HopeWorthHaving.com. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having. Thank you.

The post How to Live a Transformed Life Part 2 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on How to Live a Transformed Life Part 1. He will be reading out of Acts 9:1-31.

You want to live a transformed life in this world. You want to make a difference. You want to impact your family. You want to impact your children. I cannot stress enough to you that you need to be a person who is fervent in prayer.

Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders and you are listening to Hope Worth Having Radio Program. And today we are going to be back in the book of Acts, chapter nine, we’re covering verses one through thirty -one, how to live a transformed life.

There’s no greater study than the study of the life of the apostle, Paul particularly. And here we’re introduced how he came to Christ, a man who was a persecutor, became a follower of Jesus Christ. So I want you to join me as we study together.

You have your Bible this morning. I want you to join me in Acts, chapter nine is where we’re going to be at this morning, Acts, chapter nine. And let me just say this as you’re turning there, that’s the key that if we would exalt Jesus Christ in our own lives and we would exalt Him in this nation, then God would heal this land and God would bless this country.

We are in the midst of tumultuous times and very difficult for us to process all that we are witnessing the protective hand of God being pulled back across this country because of a people who have rejected Jesus Christ and have not kept Him first and we have turned to our own ways and we have sought our own desires rather than seeking Jesus Christ.

But we must see it continually, church, as a wake -up call. for us as the family of God, for us as a nation to turn back to God and to make him a priority in our life. And he cannot just be a part of our schedule and it cannot be that just we throw in God whenever it fits or we feel comfortable with it but we must be fully surrendered to him and he must be number one in our life.

The Scriptures teach us that he is preeminent. He is the preeminent God. That means that he’s number one. He is first place in our hearts. The hope of America is not going to come from the government but it is going to come through a relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

As we are walking in these days, days of difficulties, days of so many changes. that it makes us feel so unstable and insecure in our lives and we wonder and question what might the future be for not only us but for our children and for our grandchildren.

It is essential that we be firm, that we be strong, that we be courageous in these times, and that we stand strong for the Lord Jesus Christ. When we come to Acts chapter 9, what we are witnessing is the transformation of a man whose name is Saul.

He is transformed from a man named Saul who denied God, who hated Christianity, wanted nothing to do with Jesus Christ, and did everything he could to destroy the church to being transformed into a man who would become an apostle for God.

His name would change from Saul to Paul and he would become a great leader in the kingdom of Christ. It reminds me of the story that I read a while back about a gentle pastor from South Korea. His name was Kim Shin -jo and he was a trained killer.

In January of 1968, Joe and a team of assassins descended from North Korea slipping through the woods into a daring attempt to kill the president of South Korea. The team of 31 commandos made it to within a few hundred meters of the president’s residence before they were intercepted.

A fierce battle ensued, killing 30 South Koreans. All of the North Korean soldiers were killed except one escaped and Kim Shin -jo who was captured. After months of interrogation and through a surprising friendship with a South Korean army general, Kim Shin -jo’s hard heart started to soften.

Later, he would confess, I tried to kill the president. I was the enemy, but the South Korean people showed me sympathy and forgiveness. I was touched and moved. The South Korean government eventually released Kim Shin -jo.

Over the next three decades, he worked for the military, became a citizen, and then married and raised a family. Finally, he became a minister of the gospel. Today, Joe’s life serves as a symbol of redemption for the entire country of South Korea.

Reflecting on the day of his arrest, Kim Shin -jo commented that on that day, Kim Shin -jo died. I was reborn. I got my second chance and I’m thankful for that. Kim Shin -jo found new birth and God’s grace through the power of Christ, but his encounter with Christ came through the unexpected and surprising love of other people.

Despite his betrayal and sins, an army officer accepted him and befriended him and believed in him. At one time, he was the enemy of the South Korean people, but in the spirit of Jesus Christ, they surprised him with the startling gift of belonging, forgiveness, and even citizenship.

In the same way, the church is called to extend the gift of acceptance to others that we find, that we are to give second chances and that we are called to unleash the power of God’s goodness and grace upon the people that we interact with, even those people who are difficult and unlovable, even our enemies, we are called to show unconditional love and forgiveness.

Here we see in this life of this man, Kim Shin -jo, an amazing transformation that took place from an enemy to a friend, from a man who did not believe in the Lord Jesus Christ to one who would become a minister of the gospel.

It encapsules all that we learn about a man named Saul, Saul of Tarsus. The Bible tells us in verse 1 that Saul was still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked letters from him to the synagogues of Damascus so that if he found any who were of the way, meaning the way of Christ, whether men or women, that he He might bring them bound to Jerusalem.

As he journeyed, he came near Damascus. And suddenly a light shone around him from heaven. Then he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? And he said to me, who are you, Lord?

Then the Lord said, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. It is hard for you to kick against the goats. So he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what do you want me to do? Then the Lord said to him, arise and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.

What we see in chapter nine of the book of Acts is a man whose life is transformed. And I believe that living a transformed life is essential to helping this country come back to the Lord Jesus Christ.

And I think it’s critical for you and I to understand that each of us are called to live a transformed life. We’re not to sink into apathy. We’re not to just kind of take life and really not be effective for the Lord, but rather we are to be, as we said already, to be courageous and bold for the Lord Jesus Christ.

And how we live says a lot about our hearts and who we are within. And as people observe our life, I am convinced that they will want to know the answer to the question of what is the hope that is in your heart?

While so many are in despair and discouragement and frustrated about the circumstances of life, you and I are called to be a people of joy and hope and courage. So how is it that we can live a transformed life?

I want us to look at the Apostle Paul, who was known as Saul of Tarsus before his conversion to Christ and see how we can live a transformed life. If you’re taking notes, the first thing is that you must have faith in the Savior.

You must have faith in Jesus Christ. We see that unfolding in verses one through nine. We just read to you verses one through six, but here Saul has contact with the Savior. And as he is on the path to attack the church and to bound people into prison, we find that God struck Saul to the ground, knocked him off his high horse.

And Saul had a personal encounter with the resurrected Christ on the road to Damascus. He heard a voice and he saw a face. He saw a light. He saw the glory of God. Saul of Tarsus’ miraculous encounter with Jesus on the Damascus road brought about one of the most remarkable trials.

transformations ever recorded in the scriptures. We see in verse four that Saul is convicted by God. The Bible says he fell to the ground and he heard the voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

He said, who are you, Lord? And then the Lord said, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. It is hard for you to kick against the goat. Some of the newer translations don’t have that phrase, but I did look it up, it is in the Greek manuscript, and the word goads means simply this.

It was a stick that the farmers would use to prod or poke the animals as they were plowing the fields. And oftentimes it had a point on the end and the animal, the ox, or the animal didn’t like it and they would kick against that stick.

And they would try to prevent that farmer from goading them, if you will, or trying to pick or prick them. And so that is what the Bible is telling us. is that here, the apostle, here Saul, who would later become an apostle, is being convicted by God, and God is trying to get his attention, and God is trying to bring him to that moment of humility to where he would receive Jesus Christ as his savior.

We see immediately that Saul is recognizing that someone of a higher power, even though he does not know who it is, is truly the Lord, because he says in verse five, who are you, Lord? Jesus reveals himself and says, I am Jesus who you are persecuting.

This conversion of Saul coming to Christ is quite remarkable, because here we see someone who is fighting the church, who would soon become someone who is following Jesus Christ, and we must understand that the first step in our transformation, the first step in us making an impact upon our society, upon our families, and upon everyone that we come in contact with is that we must have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Bible teaches us that when we come to Christ, that we are new creations. We are new creations, new creatures. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 5, 17, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have passed away, and behold, all things have become new.

What I want you to know this morning is that if your faith is authentic, if your faith is real, that there is a process that is going on in your life, and that is that the old is shedding, the old is passing away.

All those old philosophies, those old attitudes, those old behaviors, those old perspectives are all passing away, and you are… now becoming this new person in the Lord Jesus Christ instantly when you put your faith in Christ you stand before Christ as a righteous person not because you are righteous not because you’ve accomplished great good deeds in this world but because of what Christ did for you on the cross and for us in that he was resurrected and now he is the perfect Son of God but that righteousness is imparted unto you it is given to you by faith but there is also positionally this understanding that though I am a believer I am still wrestling with the flesh I am still struggling with the old mindset I am still dealing with old habits in my life what is the key the key that as I come to Christ and I walk with him as I am in fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ that I allow him to transform my life in that as He has forgiven me,

as He is changing me, He is developing me into someone who is new that reflects more of Christ in my life. Following Jesus is not something that we can just do half -heartedly. Any effort to follow Christ half -heartedly only leads to you being stuck in your old habits, your old attitudes, and your old actions.

But when you fully sell out to Jesus Christ and you surrender to Him completely, you are going to watch God do something dramatic in your life in that He will change you. Now some of you are saying, Pastor Mike, I grew up in a Christian home, I grew up in a good family, and there really wasn’t so much of a dramatic change in me, but I begged to differ with you.

Your transformation may not be like Saul of Tarsus was in that this great light shone about and that you were kind of knocked off your horse, if you will, and that all of a sudden, you surrendered to God.

It may not have been as dramatic as that, but I tell you that when God revealed Himself to you and when He shone His light in your heart, that there was an understanding in your life that you were a sinner in need of a savior and that the moment that you gave your life to Jesus Christ, I am confident of this one thing, that the things that did not bother you before, like being prideful or perhaps even being selfish,

that they now as the Spirit of God lives in you, they now come to the forefront of things that God is calling you to change. It’s hard for us sometimes to change because again, we wrestle with the flesh and we don’t always want to change.

We want to hold on to the things that appeal to the flesh, but God is calling us to a life of service and a life of sacrifice. and as we surrender to Him even though our transformation may not seem so amazing on the outside, there is something that God is doing on the inside of each of our life as He is developing us into a new creation.

The second thing I want you to see here in the transformation of Saul and how to live a transformed life is that there must be fervency in our supplication or in our prayer life. We jump down to verse 10 and you’ll note again here, the Bible says now, there was a certain disciple at Damascus named Ananias, and to him the Lord said in a vision, Ananias, he said, here I am, Lord.

And the Lord said to him, arise and go to the street called strait and inquire at the house of Judas for one called Saul of Tarsus, for behold, he is what, church? He is praying. He is praying. Look at verse 12.

in a vision he has seen a man named Ananias coming in and putting his hand on him so that he might receive his sight. Have you ever thought about that? Right at the outset of verse 1 of chapter 9, Saul is breathing threats.

We go back to chapter 8. Saul is consenting to the death of a leader in the church. He is okay with the fact that Stephen has been stoned to death. And then the Bible says in verse 1 of chapter 8 that at that time a great persecution arose against the church which was at Jerusalem.

And who led that great persecution? It was Saul. He is this great persecutor of the church and he is literally willing to kill people who follow Christ. Then all of a sudden God knocks him off his high horse.

He humbles himself before Jesus Christ as he hears the voice of God in his life and he responds, Lord what do you want me to do? And in that moment of transformation he is a man who is found praying.

He is a man found praying. What is the key to you living a transformed life? It is prayer. It is fervency in your prayer. Saul hated Jesus Christ. He hated the way. He hated the people of God. But here God stopped him in his tracks and he became a man of prayer.

As he prayed what was he seeking? A relationship, a fellowship with God as opposed to some kind of religion. I want you to remember that prayer is not just a religious duty. It is not just something that we do because we feel compelled to do is to keep God happy.

But rather part of our transformation is that as we are praying God is changing us. People say to me why should I pray? Pastor, well, I want you to know, not only should you pray because God works through prayer and God has chosen to bless through prayer and that God in his sovereign will always accomplishes eternal works through the prayers of his people.

And I want you to know that we should pray because prayer blesses others and God calls us to pray, but did you know that you should pray because God will change you as you are praying? Now, so many people see prayer as for somebody else or prayer as praying for a particular circumstance or situation, rightly so, but prayer goes deeper and prayer goes further.

You wanna be that person of God? You wanna be that person who honors God in your life that be fervent in your prayers because through prayer, God is humbling your heart. Through prayer, God is shaping your heart.

Through prayer, God is molding you into the image of Christ, and He is bringing us in alignment to His will. You remember our Lord and Savior in the Garden of Gethsemane, that as He was preparing Himself to be crucified on the cross that was imminent upon Him, that He had invited the disciples to come into the Garden of Gethsemane to pray with Him.

He finds that as He looks back, that they’re sleeping. How would you feel calling on people to pray and partner with you? And when you look, you find them sleeping. You find them sleeping. The weight of the sins of the world approaching the Savior of Jesus Christ, that the immense responsibility of paying for the sins of mankind upon our Savior, and just the emotional task, the physical task that was before Him,

the Bible says, that He was sweating great drops of blood. The stress, the immensity of it weighing upon His mind, and His heart was right there. But what does He do? He calls out upon God, and He says, Lord, if it’s possible, allow this cup to pass from me.

What cup? The cup of suffering, the cup of sacrifice. He calls out to the Father, if it’s possible, let the cup of suffering pass from me. But He says, Lord, not my will, your will. What is God doing in prayer?

He is aligning your heart with His heart. For we are taught by Jesus Christ Himself in the Lord’s prayer that we are to pray, Lord, not my will, but your will. We are taught that we are to pray for God’s will to be done on earth as it is in, thank you.

And this is the alignment of prayer that God is doing in your life. who neglect prayer in their life are not only powerless and they are not seeing the eternal work of God in the hearts of their own children, in their own lives, and their people that are around them, but their hearts are not even aligned with the will of God.

You want to live a transformed life in this world? You want to make a difference? You want to impact your family? You want to impact your children? I cannot stress enough to you that you need to be a person who is fervent in prayer.

The third thing I want you to see is that we are called to be faithful in service. Look at verse 13 of chapter 9, the Bible said, Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard him, I have heard from many about this man, how much harm he has done to your saints in Jerusalem.

And here he has authority from the chief priest to bind all who call on your name. Have you ever been there? And Ananias, he was a faithful man of God. He was doing the work of Christ, and God revealed to him in a vision that he was to go to Saul, and that he was to lay his hands upon him, that Saul might receive his sights.

And Ananias is like, wait a minute, Lord. I think, A, you got the wrong man. And B, I think you don’t know who Saul is. And you and I have been there. We have said, Lord, we think that you don’t fully understand.

We have thought, you know what, Lord, maybe this is not what you clearly see what is going on here. And so here he tells the Lord, he wants to straighten him out. Verse 14 says, and here he has authority from the chief priest to bind all who call on your name.

Lord, that puts me in the fire in lane. But look at the response in verse 15. The Lord said to him, go, for he is a chosen vessel of mine to bear my name before Gentiles, kings, and the children of Israel, for I will show him how many things he must suffer for my name’s sake.

Verse 17, and Ananias went his way and entered the house and laying his hands on him, he said, brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you came, has sent me that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.

What are the keys to being faithful in service? First, there is a calling that God has upon us. I want to remind every one of you that every believer is called to be a minister. Every believer is called to some ministry.

You see. say, I wanna make a difference, then listen, you have to live a life of ministry, a life of service. You can’t wake up every day and say, I wanna live for self. You can’t wake up every day and say, I want it all to be about me.

Friends, you’ll never make any impact upon others, but when you get up in the day and say, Lord, here I am, send me, send me to that person, send me to that situation. I want to be a blessing. I want to serve you.

I want to help others. I want to make a difference. You see, there’s a call that is upon all of us. Maybe you’re not getting a vision and maybe you’re not hearing a voice and you wonder, God, do you wanna use me?

I tell you that he does. That this call is upon each and every heart that has committed their lives to the Lord Jesus Christ. There was not only the call to service, but there was the understanding of the cost of serving God.

Did you see that in verse 16? God said to Ananias, I will show him how many things he must suffer for my name’s sake. I want you to know that when you serve God, it won’t be easy. I want you to know that serving God is messy.

And why is it messy? Because people are messy and lives are a mess and there are imperfect people that live in this world and you get frustrated and you want everything to be perfect and you want everything to come together and you just want everything to be so wonderful.

But I tell you that when you serve God, you have to get your hands dirty. When you serve God, you have to be willing to humble your heart. When you serve God, I want you to know that sometimes people will misunderstand you.

They will misunderstand your motives and they’ll misunderstand what you’re trying to do to help them. When you serve God, you’re gonna get some pushback. When you serve God, even your own family might think that you’re a little weird.

Why? Because every day, through all the different media platforms that are out there, they’re told to glorify self. They’re told to live for self. They are told to make it about them. All you gotta do is listen to how people talk.

I listen to people talk and it’s always about them. It’s about how they can one up your story. But when was the last time that you heard somebody who was really interested in you, who was interested in what you are dealing with?

And they’re asking questions about your circumstances. The heart is revealed in how you listen to others. And that’s what God is telling you. There are many qualities of a transformed life. We’ve learned a few of them this week.

We’ll continue our study next week, and these stand as a standard for us as we strive to be more like Christ and the incredible transformation that God did in the life of the Apostle Paul. And I hope that you will read this and continue to dig into the Word of God on your own and that you will be encouraged and challenged.

I want to remind all of you that are able to stand with us and support us that this month for every donation that we receive, we’re sending the donors a nice New Testament soul winners Bible, something that you can keep in your car, your purse, or even your pocket and you can use it as you are sharing Christ with others.

I hope you’ll take advantage of this and it gives you many Bible verses how to answer different questions or topics that people might have. when you’re discussing and having those spiritual conversations.

This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.

The post How to Live a Transformed Life Part 1 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on The Power of Example (Mother’s Day). He will be reading out of Ruth 1:16, 19-22.

The post The Power of Example (Mother’s Day) first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on Christian Parenting Part 2.

The post Christian Parenting Part 2 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on The Road to Salvation. He will be reading out of Acts 8:26-40.

The post The Road to Salvation first appeared on Hope Worth Having.