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you got to have your own relationship
you have to make your own choice you
have to go and gather him up for
yourself
you have to taste and see
for yourself how good he is you can
celebrate him in the testimonies of
other people in the experience of other
people till you are blue in the face but
there’s got to come a time where you
decide i’m going to stop sitting on the
periphery and applauding his experience
with other folks you got to decide today
will be the day that i go and gather him
up for myself
years and years ago man my babies were
little
i remember this because i traveled to
memphis on one particular occasion and i
remember this because i was exhausted i
was so tired um you know my kids were
small at the time and i happened to take
this particular trip uh by myself and i
traveled to memphis and i remember being
so excited when the lady picked me up
from the airport that was a part of the
church that i was going to be
ministering at she took me to from the
airport to the hotel it was early
evening i was so glad anybody ever been
glad to just go to bed at 8 pm
i could not wait i laid down in the bed
ready to get a good night of sleep and i
was jolted awake about two o’clock three
o’clock in the morning because there was
a train that went by right outside the
window of our hotel
the conductor of the train was sitting
on the horn as the long train blaze
right outside of the hotel where i was
sleeping i sat straight up in bed sort
of alarmed by the noise went and looked
out of the window and realized that
literally the train tracks were right
there and it was one of those very long
trains with a lot of cars that went
whisking by it took a while for the
train to finally pass by and settle i
tried to go
back to sleep as best i could
lady came back to pick me up that
particular morning because the
conference started i had to be there
very early in the morning so it was
about 6 30 or so anyway that i was gonna
have to get up and get dressed and get
ready for a 7 15 or 7 30 pick up
and so i got in the car and i didn’t
really really say anything no big deal
we had a great day at the conference i
went back to sleep that night thinking
of course that the night before had been
a fluke and that that train wasn’t
coming by again went to sleep about 8 30
9 00 p.m so glad to get a good full
night of sleep but 3 am you guessed it
that train went roaring by right outside
the window i sat straight up in bed not
believing that this was happening again
and i couldn’t even get back to sleep
that night
i couldn’t wait for that sweet lady to
come pick me up the next morning
i sat down in the car and i said so hey
did you know that there is a train
that goes by about three o’clock in the
morning at least the last two mornings
that that i’ve been here that train has
gone by in the middle of the night
woking me straight up out of my sleep
and she had this look of complete horror
and regret written all over her face she
said
i am so sorry i didn’t even think about
the fact that that train goes by because
those of us who live in this community
have grown so used to the sound of the
train
that it doesn’t even occur to us when
it’s passing through anymore
it occurs to me that those of us who
live particularly in this western part
of the world where the presence of god
has been so lavishly given to us we’re
on every street corner we see another
church with a pastor that preaches the
good news of jesus christ where we can
turn on christian radio stations or go
across town to the christian bookstore
where we live as women in a day and age
and generation where there have never
been ever in history so many bible study
resources by women for women what could
it be that we’ve grown so used to the
blessing of the presence of god that
when the train of god’s glory falls when
god’s presence comes and marks and
and permeates our presence that we don’t
even recognize it anymore
that god has so blessed us that we’re
too blessed for our own good
that we don’t see the fingerprints of
god in our lives that when there’s even
just a hint of disappointment or
discouragement or frustration or
irritation in our life that we are
blinded to the fact that even when
things are dark
the light of god’s presence can still be
found if we’ll just open up our eyes
may we never be
desensitized to the presence of god
and if you have your bibles and you want
to look with me at a passage of
scripture i’ll just read it to you that
i want to point out today if you still
you know actually use a bible with paper
pages like i do
or your iphone your ipad any manner of
eyeness is fine in luke chapter 2 there
are a group of people who are about to
be in the presence of god and they’re
not even going to recognize it
i will tell you as you turn to luke
chapter 2 that the author luke wrote
this gospel and recorded these stories
really to show us how to have an
encounter with jesus to not miss him
when his presence is near and by the way
this is our goal as believers this is
the reason why he died on the cross of
calvary so that we could not just know
about him but so that we can encounter
him we’re not just supposed to read in
the old testament about how he divided
the red sea or caused the walls of
jericho to come tumbling down or met
with a man named moses in the form of a
burning bush or showed up as the angel
of the lord in a wine press while a
fearful timid gideon was beating out
wine uh threshing wheat rather in that
wine press we’re not just supposed to
read about others that had an encounter
with jesus we’re not just supposed to
see and applaud and experience the
testimonies of other people they’re
supposed to encourage us to realize that
if regular folks like that can encounter
him so can we
and luke comes along and he writes story
after story in his gospel to show us
that we can have an encounter with jesus
these people that he is writing to and
that he’s writing about we’re in a time
of national decay
there is chaos
happening and swirling around them
morally and socially and you and i can
relate to that because they were not
just in a time of national decay so
are we
our country is in a state of more social
decay and decline than we’ve ever seen
before and the more god is marginalized
and segmented to the periphery of
society the worse things are gonna get
the more he is completely ignored and
disregarded the more we’re going to see
the influx of chaos and destruction but
today i don’t want y’all to worry about
the white house i want to get to your
house
i want to talk about the destruction and
the decay happening maybe underneath the
roof of your own home luke is writing
not just then but now to people who need
a savior
folks who are waiting on a hero to show
up and rescue them
from the plight of their own
circumstances luke was writing to them
but by the holy spirit he is writing to
us today for any of you who are in a
state of decline in some area of your
life where we’re seeing against the
backdrop of darkness this need we have
for the savior to manifest himself for
us to not just know about him from afar
applauding him in the testimonies of
other people but if anybody wants to
experience him themselves than luke is
writing to you
and i want somebody to know this today
that sometimes
sometimes your difficulties are less
about the enemy being against you
and more about god wanting you to show
wanting to show you what it looks like
when he is for you
sometimes it’s about him finally wanting
his daughter’s eyes to be open so that
when he shows up they’re sensitive
enough to see him
luke chapter 2 verse 25
says and behold
there was a man in jerusalem whose name
was simeon
this man was righteous and devout and
looking for the consolation he was
looking for some hope y’all
looking for the consolation of israel
and the holy spirit was upon him
and it had been revealed to him by the
holy spirit that he would not see death
before he had seen the lord’s christ
and he came in the spirit into the
temple
and when the parents brought in the
child jesus to carry out for him the
custom of the law he took jesus he went
over to this couple grabbed this 40-day
old child into his arms and he blessed
god and said now lord you can let your
servant depart in peace because
according to thy word my eyes have seen
your salvation
you have prepared your salvation in the
presence of all the people a light of
revelation the glory of thy people
israel and mary and joseph they were
amazed at the things that were being
said
about their son
jesus christ
here on this occasion mary and joseph
have come into the temple for um the
purification ceremony it was traditional
it was ceremonial that about 40 days
after a baby was born and the
purification process had taken place
that the parents of a new baby would
bring their baby into the temple to
offer specific sacrifices a burnt
offering a sin offering
and just to present their child to the
lord now traditionally when folks came
into the temple they would bring
sacrifices and if you look back into the
book of leviticus the details of those
sacrifices are given they would need to
have a pigeon for a particular sacrifice
they would need to have a lamb for
another sacrifice and there is a caveat
i’m just going to take a little rabbit
trail for a second because i love that
y’all like rabbit trails
there’s a little caveat given in luke
leviticus chapter 12 that says that if
someone is not wealthy enough if they do
not have the resources to actually
purchase a lamb for this sacrifice that
they actually can just bring two pigeons
and i didn’t read all the details here
but a few verses earlier than where we
started in verse 25 it tells us that
mary and joseph come into the temple
with two pigeons or two turtle doves
they they don’t have a lamb which
indicates to us that they have expended
so much of their resources that they are
in a state of poverty at least enough
but they were not able to afford their
own lamb they’ve got two pigeons that’s
all they had to bring on this occasion
as they bring their new baby into the
tabernacle to present him to the lord
they’ve got these two pigeons which
means that when they walked into the
temple people would have looked at them
and recognized them as a couple that was
of ins that had insufficient funds as a
couple that was lacking as a poor couple
they would have been looked down upon
people would have marginalized them
because they did not have the
accoutrements of wealth that everybody
else in the building had
so they did not have a lamb and yet they
have in their possession the lamb that
takes away the sins of the world can i
just say to anybody who is in the room
and you felt like an outcast because you
don’t wear what everybody else wears you
can’t afford to drive what everybody
else drives you don’t have the resources
to live in the neighborhood where
everybody else lives listen my friend
even if you do not have a lamb you might
be in the perfect position to make sure
you have intimacy with the lamb who
takes away the sins of the world
and can i tell you that sometimes it is
our affluence that keeps us from having
the lamb of god in our grasp intimacy
and fellowship with him like never
before
the people that i have met that have
more of an integral intimate ongoing
fervent passionate relationship with
jesus christ they are not the people
sometimes that live in the mansion on
the hill it’s the people in a hut in a
village with thatched roofs and dirt
floors who have in their desperation had
an encounter with jesus christ
and y’all i have met people in third
world countries who pray for us
oh they pray for us they feel bad for us
because they say we pray
anemic self-centered prayers
they listen to our prayers that are so
focused on having more comfort than we
already have we’re in their desperation
they have met with jesus they have seen
him with their own eyes they have been
marked by the presence of god they have
watched god show up in so much splendor
and they want that for us
[Applause]
sometimes when we can afford our own
lamb
it pushes out
the opportunity and the margin that
should be reserved for the lamb
comfortable people
pray anemic prayers
it’s desperation
it’s insufficiency
it’s lack it’s emptiness when you find
yourself in that state where like mary
and joseph you don’t have enough to buy
your own lamb anymore
that might be the perfect setup for your
encounter with the lamb of god
and so they are coming into the temple
with the lamb
he’s in their arms they walk in
to the temple
y’all there at church
there’s a group of people including
religious leaders pharisees and
sadducees that have all gathered around
probably hundreds of people all carrying
their sacrifices that have joined in
on this occasion
and they’ve been waiting all of these
people have been waiting on the messiah
they’ve been waiting for the kingdom of
god to be at hand
they’ve been waiting on a king to ride
in on a white horse and to redeem them
from all that has been lost and how
they’ve lost as a nation they’ve been
waiting for somebody to rescue them from
the oppression of rome they have been
looking for a hero
and the hero comes in
and they do not recognize him
they are at church
and they do not recognize the presence
of god
the reason why is because he has come in
a package
that they do not prefer
he has come in a package that does not
align with their expectations and so
because he does not look like what they
wanted him to look like about what they
had in their own estimation prepared as
the package that would be in their
estimation the best package for the king
to arrive because their circumstance
does not look like and he has not
appeared the way that they prefer they
downplay the messiah when he arrives i
want to submit to you
that jesus is there
in this difficult moment in your
marriage in this trying moment in your
finances in this struggle on your job in
this difficulty in this relationship
you’re rubbing corners with your boss or
your spouse or this struggle you’re
having on your university campus or in
your high school campus this hard time
that you were having he is there he just
may have come in the package you don’t
prefer
and that oftentimes the fingerprints of
god are not recognized not because he’s
not there it is just because the
expectation we have set up about what he
looks like and how he will speak and how
he will move the prayer request the
solution that he will bring doesn’t
align with the prayer requests that we
have prayed we have boxed god into the
way we want him to answer instead of
believing that his ways are not our ways
and his thoughts are not our thoughts as
high as the heavens are above the earth
that’s how high his thoughts are above
our own and so we box god in when we say
lord answer my request in this
particular way do you know
that you limit not god but you limit i
limit our experience of god when we say
lord answer my request exactly this way
i have learned to pray here lord is my
request you said that i can make it
known here’s how i would like to see you
in my circumstance thank you lord that i
can come boldly and make my request
known so i’ve made my request but at the
end of that prayer i’ve learned to pray
lord
do it
or do something better
because do you know there are categories
of options
that our brain doesn’t even know are
available and accessible to us and if we
limit god to what we can think and what
we see as the way we have not even
considered
the categories of opportunity that this
divine holy almighty being has
accessible to him y’all he’s not just
thinking about you he’s thinking about
your children and your grandchildren and
your great-grandchildren and those that
are to come and how his kingdom purposes
are going to be outworked in this
generation
and so on this occasion the messiah
shows up and nobody recognizes him
except somebody say accept
except a guy named simeon
he had been told and promised
just like we have
that he would see
the manifest presence of god he’d been
told it
he’d been promised just like we’ve been
promised because of our relationship
with god through christ jesus and the
holy spirit indwelling us that we will
see the fingerprints of god working in
our lives this is called the manifest
presence of god
it is unique to omnipresence
omnipresence means that god is
everywhere all at the same time i’m so
grateful for god’s omnipresence because
god’s omnipresence means that when i fly
back to dallas where i live when my new
friends that i just met from uganda fly
back to where they live um that when you
all fly back to wherever ever it is
you’ve come from whether all over
different areas of california or afar it
means that no matter where we go he is
as much with me as he is with you
because he is omnipresent
but if you’re anything like me you’re
grateful for his omnipresence but you
want more than that
you want the manifested presence of god
i’m talking about where you can look
back over your circumstances and realize
that his fingerprints were all
throughout that thing i’m talking about
where you can see footprints in the sand
as you actually recognize that god was
walking beside you the whole way i’m
talking about what other people call
coincidence encounters you see the
sovereign hand of god that was aligning
your footsteps and setting you in the
right place at the exact right time the
manifest presence of god
i wanted to know what made simeon’s eyes
open to recognize what nobody else in
this scenario did i figured whatever
opened up his eyes might open up our
eyes as well are you ready three things
that i want to point out to you it says
in verse 26 about simeon it says that it
had been
actually verse 25 i want to start there
there was a man in jerusalem whose name
was simeon he was righteous devout
looking for the consolation of israel we
could spend a whole lot of time in those
three but here’s where i want to heart
the holy spirit
was upon him
the holy spirit
was upon him
it says
that he came into the temple verse 27
in
the spirit
verse 26 says it had been revealed to
him
by
the holy spirit
look at the presence of the holy spirit
permeating this text look at how the
author has over and over and over again
highlighted the work of the holy spirit
in opening up simeon’s eyes to be able
to recognize the manifested presence of
god before him in the person of jesus
christ luke
here he is just in the second chapter of
this book and by the way just in these
first two chapters he has already
alluded to the spirit 10 times
the work of god’s spirit is so powerful
and so needful to a fruitful experience
in the life of the of the believer that
even before the book of acts even before
pentecost even before the spirit has
come
luke points out the movement of the
spirit here in the life of simeon this
shows you how important the spirit’s
work is how critical it is to making
sure that your spiritual senses your
spiritual radar is heightened so that
you can detect the presence of god
the holy spirit was upon him now i want
you to see the work of god’s spirit this
is just the first uh characteristic of
simeon but i want to just just take some
time for just a few moments on it the
work of god’s spirit is so important it
deserves a little bit of our attention
here there are three ways that the holy
spirit is described
as relating to simeon in these few
verses just just a few ways that the
holy spirit relates to simeon in these
few verses the first thing it says is
that the holy spirit was upon him now
listen i want you to know that if you
have placed faith in jesus christ the
holy spirit lives on the inside of you
ephesians chapter 1
says that the moment you believed you
received the holy spirit you were sealed
by the holy spirit of promise
i want you to know that at the moment
you became a believer in jesus christ
you received the most incredible gift
you will ever receive this side of
eternity and that is the very presence
of god living on the inside of you the
holy spirit is not a ghost or a wind or
a fire or a dove he is often symbolized
by those things but don’t minimize him
that ain’t who he is the holy spirit is
the third person of the trinity not
third because he is least in value just
third because he’s the last to be
revealed to us in the pages of scripture
but all of the power all of the glory
all of the authority all of the grandeur
of god the father is in the person of
the holy spirit
which means
if you’re a believer in the holy spirit
lives in you
that means all of the grandeur and all
of the greatness all of the authority of
god himself now lives on the inside of
you so if you are a believer you have
the holy spirit you are not waiting on
more of the holy spirit all of the holy
spirit you ever gonna get you got the
moment you got saved
now you do need to be filled by god’s
spirit
so that his influence in your life grows
and grows so that you operate under the
gifting of the spirit so that you can
live according to the fruit of the
spirit that means living beyond your
natural capacity it means when your
patience runs out you can still have
more patience with that person it means
when gentleness has long since left the
building
you still find you got a little
gentleness for that when self-discipline
i mean you just don’t have no more
self-discipline in that area we need the
fruit of god’s spirit so we need to be
filled by the spirit as we yield to him
in obedience we are filled which means
he influences us more our mind is
renewed and transformed we are
sanctified into the image of christ
jesus
so the holy spirit is in you
but simeon
his relationship with the spirit is not
described in that way
it doesn’t say that the spirit was in
him
it says that the holy spirit was on him
which means
there is a difference between the spirit
being in you
and the spirit resting on you
listen to me
the gift of god’s spirit in you oh this
brings tears to my eyes
the gift of god’s spirit in you
he will never leave you nor forsake you
there is nothing you can do to work
yourself out of a relationship with the
holy spirit
okay
but him being on you
you got to live a life i i want to live
a life that is a magnet for the presence
of god to rest on me
we can sit in this conference until
we’re blue in the face and applaud the
truths of god and say amen to the truths
of god but if we leave this room and
live in a way
that is out of alignment with the truth
of god we will not have the spirit
resting on us
if you want the mark of god’s presence
on you i’m talking about where other
people can see you operating in your
gift moving about in the assignments
that you have been given where they can
just see there’s a unique favor on your
life toward that particular task or that
particular endeavor where you are marked
by something that gives you favor that
gives you his grace for a particular
area of your life then you must live i
must choose to live in a way that honors
god so that god’s presence can rest upon
us
because he will not force himself on you
he offers you this resting of his
presence and his grace upon your life if
you will choose to live in a way that
does not
disturb his presence that does not keep
him from being able to be near you
because you have chosen here it is to be
holy
listen to me
are you listening
you all we live in a day and age where
we have become more interested in being
impressive
than being holy
where we are more interested in making
sure we have likes
and friends
and the applause of people more than
just being flat out
holy
by making sure that political
correctness is not our main goal
that we’re not after the applause of
people we’re after the applause of
heaven
you got to choose to be ye holy
and so i implore you sisters by the
mercies of god
to walk in a manner
worthy of the calling by which you have
been called
so the spirit rested upon him let me
just show you quickly verse 26 says that
the spirit revealed to him
so that means the spirit not only rested
upon him the spirits revealed to him old
preachers call this
illumination
it’s shining a spotlight it’s when
you’re sitting in church on a sunday and
your pastor opens up the bible to preach
and man he just reads or she reads that
first two verses that that they’re going
to be preaching from and you sit
straight up in your seat because you
feel like
it’s all about you
anybody know what i’m talking about
it’s where you’re trying to figure out
how
did the church bug my house how did they
know
that’s the illumination of the spirit
it’s when he it’s when the old truths of
scripture scripture leap up off the page
and for lack of a better way word it’s
when they grip you in your soul where
you see how that intersects with
something you are personally facing
today that is the revelation of the holy
spirit this is what the holy spirit does
he reveals he illumines he shines the
spotlight simeon was there that day
because he had been promised by the
revelation of god’s spirit it wasn’t
just a random promise it was his promise
oh you’ve had that happen over the
course of these days that we’ve been
gathered you probably have had that
happen where something that has been
said it wasn’t just great to hear it it
gripped your soul
you knew it was an assignment for you it
was a conviction that you knew the lord
was going to send you out of here with
that assignment because the holy spirit
revealed it to you
god’s spirit rests he reveals and then
he ruled simeon because it says in verse
27 that he came in the spirit to the
temple meaning the spirit told him on
this day to go into the temple and it
says that he came into the spirit under
the into the temple under the conviction
of the holy spirit when the spirit said
go
simeon said
yes sir
he submitted to the leadership of the
holy spirit
and he was in the right place at the
right time to run right smack dab into
the messiah because he was submitted
to the leadership of the holy spirit
do you know that the more you ignore
ignore that still small conviction the
quieter that voice will become
not because he is no longer speaking but
because you’ve built a callus of
disobedience
you have muffled the voice of the holy
spirit so it is better to be so
sensitive to god’s holy spirit that
sometimes you give when maybe he hasn’t
even prompted you to give but it’s okay
because to the best of your capacity you
are obeying the holy spirit of god just
to keep those airways open and clear
from the disobedience that will begin to
muffle his voice in your life because
more than anything else the enemy wants
you disconnected
from the privilege of hearing the voice
of god y’all this is what separates our
faith from every other so-called faith
on the face of the earth it’s that our
god is alive
it’s that he speaks it’s that we have
the privilege to hear his voice
never downplay or minimize the value the
beauty the lavish grace of this
privilege that we have to hear the voice
of god
so the holy spirit rested upon him there
are two other things that i want to
point out to you that were symbolic or
was were significant about simeon that
opened up his eyes to see jesus as he
was to be seen
in this package that other people
downplayed and found insignificant that
they totally ignored because they didn’t
think that their king would look like
that here’s what opened simeon’s eyes
not only that he was in the spirit when
he came into the temple and by the way
here’s another rabbit trail sorry
if we came to church in the spirit
it would change our experience in church
can i just say that
because while everybody else was looking
at that poor couple wondering why in the
world they were in their midst and
discounting mary and joseph
simeon came in the spirit and he was
less concerned about who was wearing
what and who was driving up what and who
sat where and who was in his seat and
whether or not it was hot outside and
they had to walk far to go take their
children to sunday school they were he
was less concerned about his convenience
whether or not the preacher preached
good was irrelevant to him he was
looking for jesus
whether or not the microphones were
perfectly balanced or the lights were
exactly as they should be whether or not
the ld screens were on full display that
day whether or not the ushers were or
were not kind was not his priority he
had come with his eyes peeled for jesus
we would be less critical and less
skeptical if we came to church in the
spirit
then the pressure wouldn’t be on the
person who’s on the stage because you
didn’t come to see them you came to see
jesus
okay verse 27
so he comes in the spirit and then look
what happens in verse 27 the parents
bring in the child jesus
jesus comes in in his parents arms
look at the savior look at how the
manifest presence of god arrives on this
remarkable day watch him show up into
the experience of this aged saint named
simeon in a very personal way and on to
the landscape of human history he
arrives in the arms of his parents
there is something about the way we see
jesus when we look at him through the
well-worn paths
that have been hewned out by our parents
our grandparents our great-grandparents
our forefathers and our foremothers
spiritually speaking the people who have
gone before us and have walked with
jesus just a little while who’ve spent
their lives serving him i’m always
nervous
when i see a young group of christians
with their little skinny jeans and their
lattes and their avocado toast
which i love by the way
i’m just always a little nervous when i
see them instagramming all their
religious experiences without the
oversight of some spiritual parents
because y’all we have modernized jesus
today
the modern version of jesus that we have
crafted he has made him watered down now
he’s tolerant of sin without the
expectation of holiness our jesus is
politically correct
we need to see jesus coming in the arms
of our parents the people who have gone
before us the folks who have walked the
road a little while who know what
hymnals are
who sang the good old hymns that were
based in some theology we got to make
sure that our new praise and worship
songs i love them we got to make sure
they’re rooted in some good theology
[Applause]
and so the package may change listen
y’all i i still go to the kind of church
it’s come a long way but it started when
i was one year old the church that i go
to now so you know back in the day
there was no way in the world i would
have ever gotten on a stage with with
pants are you kidding me
anybody know what kind of church i’m
talking about we still have a few people
in our church a few mothers of the
church if anybody knows what i mean
jeans in the church are you kidding me
they came in in their suits i’m talking
about where the skirt matches the jacket
like they were bought together
and not only that but underneath that
suit she’s gonna have some actual
pantyhose on i’m not talking about spanx
with the feet cut out uh i mean
pantyhose
the ones with the girdle top anybody
know what i’m talking about anybody
remember that
and she’s gonna have a handbag in her
hand and that handbag that clutch is
going to match that jacket which matches
that skirt which matches her patent
leather shoes that she has on her feet
closed toe patent leather shoes
but the outfit is never complete
and you know it ain’t no regular hat
right you know it’s got something it’s a
feather
or a net or something that’s sitting
just like this
and she’s gonna worship god
anybody know what kind of church i’m
talking about
and i love when she comes up to give a
testimony
about what she has seen the lord
it might not be modern it might not be
new and improved
but it’s the jesus of abraham isaac and
jacob
it’s the god of our forefathers
there’s some things you cannot learn on
there are some things you just need to
be with a mother of the church somebody
who’s walked the road a little bit
longer than you to make sure you can
bounce off of her or him from the true
theological biblically based
unchanging venerated word of god
so the package may change but the
principles never do y’all
jesus was never politically correct he
was always a revolutionary he never
dismissed sinned he called it out in in
grace but most certainly in truth he was
never watered down he always said i am
the only way
i am the truth and i am the end the life
he didn’t acquiesce or tolerate he loved
but he did say repent for the kingdom of
god is at hand
god made us in his image
and one philosopher said we have now
returned the favor favor by trying to
make him in ours
we gotta see jesus says he’s always
meant to be seen and sometimes it
requires you going to find a parent a
spiritual parent who can show you the
jesus of the bible
simeon saw jesus because
as he was meant to be seen he saw him in
the package in which our savior wanted
to come because there were some
spiritual parents who were willing to
bring him in
so i speak to the younger people that
are in this room i’m telling you
check your arrogance
check our lack of teachability where
sometimes we just think we know it all
so we won’t recognize and see the beauty
of our savior because we won’t receive
him from the parents who are trying to
give him to us
so the package may change change the
package enjoy that freedom but watch and
make sure that you’re sticking to the
true milk of the word of god
and then can i implore you
who are in this room and you’ve sort of
graduated to that parent department
take this as your privilege
to carry jesus to those who need him
to see him and experience him as you
will bring him simeon shows us that in
order to have our eyes open his
experience demonstrates to us that we
need to have the holy spirit upon us
and we need to be looking for how the
parents bring him into our experience
but finally it says in verse 28 that as
soon as he caught a glimpse of him he
went over look at the boldness look at
the audacity look at the eagerness of
simeon he runs over to the parents he
takes the baby
out of their arms and gathers him to
himself
because an experience with jesus from
afar
wasn’t enough for simeon
can i just tell you in this room that
god does not have grandchildren
you got to have your own relationship
you have to make your own choice you
have to go and gather him up for
yourself
you have to taste and see for yourself
how good he is you can celebrate him in
the testimonies of other people in the
experience of other people till you are
blue in the face but there’s got to come
a time where you decide i’m going to
stop sitting on the periphery and
applauding his experience with other
folks you got to decide today will be
the day that i go and gather him up for
myself
that i start to spend time with him in
prayer and in conversation so that i can
take advantage of this privilege to hear
his voice and to speak to him in prayer
that i won’t let everybody keep spoon
feeding me the word of god i’m going to
go to the scriptures myself and know
that i too can have an ongoing fervent
relationship with jesus i’m going to
gather him up in my own arms and when
you do you will see him
and experience him and encounter him in
a way you have never encountered him
before
at tbn our mission is to use every
available means to reach as many
individuals and families as possible
with the life-changing gospel of jesus
christ thank you for helping make
the gospel of grace go around the world
without you we couldn’t do it god bless
you