S2 Episode 15 | Broken churches and I forgot my watch!

S2 Episode 15 | Broken churches and I forgot my watch! In this episode Leon discusses the things most Pastors, preachers and teachers won't. He also discusses the life of Solomon. Please Like, Share and Subscribe for more!

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:10

Hello and welcome to the Unqualified Podcast with Leon Wilson. That's me. Thank y'all for joining us on this Sunday. We uh we have just um finished a a service today that I I feel like was just man, the Lord is just growing our church. And and um it if you've not heard about us, um I pastored the um it's called Mercy Church, and uh we're in currently we're in Pacalet, South Carolina, and we're growing exponentially, and uh the Lord's just doing a whole lot with us. Um we've he's answered prayers we haven't even prayed um and and poured into our our little church in so many different ways. And the church maybe could see a hundred people, and um we, you know, like this past Sunday, Easter Sunday, we had uh 75, and and we have we had one joined today, and uh it's on Wednesday nights we're averaging like 30, and and we're only six months into it. Like the 26th of this month will be six months into Mercy Church um after founding it on October 26th. So the Lord has done so much, and it it's not us, I can assure you, it's not me. It's it's just God being God. And all we've done is commit to the idea and and to the principle to put God first. And so that's what we're doing. That's and that's all we're trying to do is to put God first and to share the gospel any kind of way we can and celebrate God. Um, and that's I think the we're, you know, uh well, it's not that I think that's the case. Uh, you can see the evidence in a lot of churches where they have put God in a backseat or in in the back room somewhere, and it's about the church this, church that, and and what's going to grow the church, or you know, what can we do for this, that, or the other thing. And what we're doing is putting the gospel out there and saying, how can we share the gospel? You know, how can we love on our kids? How can we love on our people, but you know, in a way that shares the gospel, and that's it. Um, and like even we had a um we had an Easter event where we had a bouncy house, we had pizza, we had popcorn and um cornhole, and and um the Easter bunny was there and um and all that, but I pulled everybody up and we all and we I presented the gospel. Here's the gospel. So this is why we're here. We're not here because um, you know, because we just wanted to start a church, it and we're not here for the money. We're it's it's for God. And so it is uh it like I said, it's six months. We're we're coming up on our six-month mark, and we are outgrowing this church. Like we're on pace to outgrow the church. And so currently we're looking for property and um and we're seeing um, you know, we're seeing what the Lord's gonna present to us. So um that's where we're at. Um, and here's the sad part, and I don't say this with pride in my voice at all. I say it with humility and a lot of hurt that there are chart there are a lot of churches who are closing the doors, pastors stepping down, um, preachers giving up, um that are maybe five to seven people, and you drive by these churches and you see five cars in the parking lot, and you you you wonder where where the energy went? Where where's God in this? And I think with with the gravity of that, you have to consider this. When was the last time the Lord was invited to church? To your church. Because I've seen I've seen a lot of these churches in the area have hundreds, hundreds of people, and events that would would eclipse a event like um that the state would put on or something like that. Like you would think that it would be like something that a a network television um channel would like put out. I forgot my watch. So um preached without it today, and I my wife's like, what time is it? What time is it? And I'm like, I don't even know. I don't even know. So um, but either way, yeah. So but driving by these churches and seeing the parking lots nearly empty or growing empty and and seeing folks just walking away from a lot of these churches, preachers that are being, you know, just throwing in a towel and and being done and walking away from the ministry and and all that, it breaks my heart. It just absolutely breaks my heart. And I'm here to tell you, we have we have reached out to a church and and then we put the feelers out to perhaps merge with another church, and you know, folks still want to hold on. They they have a death grip like on their ideology, and it and like, oh no, we're not gonna do that, you know, not interested. We're gonna try to do this, do that, whatever, and you know, effectively, like we're gonna resurrect our church. And I mean, I don't have an ego, so it's not gonna bother me one bit that someone says, no, we're going in a different direction. This is what bothers me. You are steadily doing the same thing over and over and over, and you're expecting a different result. What's that the definition of? And then on the on the whole other thing is like, if what you're doing, if what you've been doing isn't working, then why? Question chief among them all is where's the Holy Ghost in all this? Like if this is what you're doing and your church is failing, and and whatever, and and you know, the churches in the in and of themselves, that's not going to fail. It's the ideology that's pushing it, it's the leadership that's pushing it, and it's whoever's steering the direction of this church. If it's not God, if it's anything other than God, then you are failing the church. The church hasn't failed you. You're failing the church. And I, you know, like I have conversations with people all the time, and they approach me. I I don't approach them about it, but they approach me about it, and um you know, and present this case about what's going on at different churches and whatever. And it's not like I want to talk about this. I I got better things to do than to talk about this. But if you're presenting a problem to me, and and my response is, well, where's the Holy Ghost in all this? Where's God in all this? Who's praying? Who's who's having a meeting? Who's who's you know saying, hey, what do we need to do to get back on track and in alignment with that Bible and have things decent and in order? And if the answers are, well, we don't even know. We don't know. There's no one wants to talk about it. Like we've got problems, but no one wants to talk about it. Well, then my part of the conversation is done, because the whole point is is keeping God at the forefront of the direction that the church is going. And God is not a man, so your point of view is way below his point of view, because God's point of view is sovereign. The designer and speaker and painter and artist of the entire universe isn't worried about the opinion of a man, he already has the direction you need to go. The problem is our opinions and everything aren't aligning with his direction. Instead, we're way off to the side. And that's the problem. I watched um I watched in in a f in a few um churches, you know, like a preacher either stepped down or or um or was asked to leave and that previous preacher installed the next person. And it and nothing changed, like the direction of the church hasn't changed, any of them. And it makes me it makes me wonder, you know, like do the people have a voice? Let me say this to all you parishioners out there. If if you go to a church and you um you do not agree with the direction the church is going, and it's a biblical reason for why you're not agreeing with it, and and you're you know, you're at your wit's end. Here, let me tell you the un this is the unpopular thing from one pastor to to a member. And I, you know, I'm I'm also member, right? Like um, I wasn't always a pastor, and I haven't been a pastor for very long. I've been pastoring for a little over a year now. Well, uh it'll be a it'll be two years in July. But here's the deal you vote three ways in a church. You vote with your voice, you vote with your money, and you vote with your feet. Three ways. If your voice isn't being heard, your money can get heard, and if both of those aren't going to get heard, then you have to vote with your feet. But if you cannot be the change, and here's the problem with a lot of a lot of a lot of peace uh preachers, pastors, uh teachers, and what have you, they they don't want to hear your voice, they don't want to hear your opinion, they don't want you to voice your opinion or anything, but they certainly want you to keep throwing your money into the coffer. Um, you know, and and I'm saying this, I'm an unpaid pastor. There's no paid positions at Mercy Church. We're trying to grow the church. We are trying to produce fruit. And um, as of right now, there's no paid positions at our church. All the money that comes into our church, tithes, offering, donations, all that, go into producing fruit at this point and growing um so that we can build a church and and have our permanent um permanent place. And it'll be up to the church to decide when Leon Wilson goes full-time. That's not Leon Wilson's call. And that sounds backwards probably to you because you're used to churches operating in different ways. I'm telling you, my my job, my position is to serve the church, not the church to serve Leon Wilson. So just that take that as your side note. Here's the deal. A lot of these preachers, pastors, teachers, and all these, they want you to throw your money into the coffer and they want you to shut up, take your back seat, and just say amen every once in a while. A lot of them don't even want you to say amen. They just want you to be there. Long as your long as your dollars come with it. But here's the deal. Your voice matters because your voice matters. They don't make that decision for you. And if things are out of order in your church and you see the the effects, it's not being done biblical, it's not being done decent and in order, then you have to voice your opinion. You're you're bound to do that. You are supposed to use that Bible to reprove and rebuke. And if if your voice isn't being heard, and you're not gonna, you're not gonna throw your money into the coffer in order to show acceptance for that, because silence is acceptance. And uh, and if if you don't, and no action is an action, uh just you know, just take that uh to the bank. If you do not say or do anything to show that you do not agree with what is going on, then guess what? You are complicit in the way that things are going. That's that. Um the men of the church, women of the church need a backbone and to be able to speak up and say, hey, this is wrong and call a spade a spade the way it should be. You gotta call it the way it is. If you don't, then you're you're just basically saying, okay, well, I agree. I'm going along with it. That's the problem. We live in a world where the only people that are are courageous enough to speak up are people who have perverse opinions. Like we we're okay with the blue-haired folk, and I'm just saying blue-haired folk or green-haired folk and all that that you know want us to celebrate sin. We're okay with them shouting, or we say, Oh, I can't believe they're out there parading and shouting. When the church has decided to sit back and sit on our hands and keep our mouths shut this entire time, uh, we need to have that type of uh courage. You need to have the courage of your convictions to be able to open your mouth and let the truth come out. And when you disagree with something from a biblical standpoint, you should have the courage to say something. And if you don't, then shame on you. But if you are speaking up in the church and you do uh have a valid point and no one is is moving in the direction they should, you've got three things you can do. You can vote with your mouth and speak up. You can vote with your money and stop sewing into something that you disagree with, or you can you can vote with your feet and go somewhere else. And I'm the first one to tell you that you've got to do one of the three, or one and all three. But sitting there and shutting up and allowing the church to go to get ran into the ground is not an answer if you if you care. If you don't care, then you do whatever you do. I I'm praying that you do care. But that's all that. So that's 16 minutes into the broadcast. Today I preached on Solomon. And uh man, Solomon is a um Solomon is a roller coaster of a of a of a person in the book, um, in the Bible. And and here's the thing. You can read about him in 1 Kings um chapter 10 is where we were today. That's my reference, and then 2 Corinthians or 2nd um sorry, um we were in um goodness, I I just lost it. But anyways, um preaching on um on 2 Chronicles, I'm sorry, and uh it'd be chapter 9, but um preaching on on Solomon and the Queen of Sheba and how she visited Solomon, and she was like, hey, you know, I've I've heard about this man's um about his wisdom, and it's come all the way to my area. And Sheba was in Yemen at the time, and so this lady goes 1,500, roughly 1,500 miles. It would have taken probably around two months to go from a have this wagon train of camels that uh I said she she packed her spent a night camel, but um she traveled 1500 miles, two months, to go to Jerusalem to meet with Solomon. And when she got there, she had said some interesting things, but the Bible says that she communed with Solomon and and basically poured her heart out, and that he counseled her and answered all of her questions. There was nothing that was hidden from him. He saw through everything that she had to give or that she presented and and basically was counseling her. And she was moved in such a way that she was almost faint. And and I and I was like, as I was reading all this and and thinking about all this, I'm thinking, man, you know, the Lord really showed out in Solomon's life. And he did. And when God shows out in your life and and does some amazing things, fantastic to some people, they might think, how can you even believe this? But it's true, it's all biblical truth. And when you see this, that God has shown out in this person's life the way he has, you stand there in disbelief thinking, how you know is this possible that the Lord would take somebody and pour in this type of wisdom into them and and then build them up with all this wealth, and then they build a temple, and this temple's so ornate and everything else. And and how is this even possible that that God would do this? And here's the thing, she was from Yemen, she didn't even believe in this God, but she was up here in Jerusalem praising this Lord, this God, because of what he had done for Solomon. So that makes me think of this. Here's your challenge for today. If God can do that with Solomon, maybe what what is what God is showing us in the life of Solomon is that he will pour in so much. Solomon prayed for wisdom. God gave him wisdom. But God has given you wisdom, knowledge, understanding, he's given you joy, peace, strength, all these other things. Given us children, giving us grandchildren, giving us a job, giving us a vehicle. Solomon never had a car. He had chariots and stuff. But we're able to take a flight on an airplane and go someplace hours away where Sheba took 1,500 miles in two months. We can fly in a in a few hours. I mean, that's amazing. We don't need a camel. We just need a backpack and a ticket and wherever wherever we put our credit card, we need that thing. Wallet, pocketbook, whatever you got. And just go. And be there in a few hours. You want to fly to Hawaii? Fly to Hawaii. Do whatever you want to do. Solomon was the richest man, wealthiest, most powerful man in the world at the time. From my understanding. He couldn't do things we take for granted every single day. Chapter 10 describes the Queen of Sheba visiting Solomon in his life just being so ornate, so regal. How he went after these women and all of that. I guess where I'm going with this is if you think about it. We're one decision away from ruining a huge chunk of our testimony. Queen Sheba said Everything they told me about you is true, but they They were only half right because you're double what they said. And your God surely has blessed you by putting making you a king and giving you all this. On the outside looking in, you may not know where your next meal's coming from, but somebody on the outside looking in is saying, Man, Lord, would you bless me like that? Today you might have it together. Today you you're like top of the world. Tomorrow you're thinking, My goodness, I don't even know what to do. I don't have this, that, or the other thing. Your one decision from ruining your testimony because you could just give up and go and walk away from it all. Or you can keep plugging away, keeping God in the forefront of your mind and keeping your sights on Him and saying, Lord, whatever I got to do to move the needle for you is whatever I got to do to hit the mark for you, whatever I got to do to glorify you, to praise you, to lift you up, to encourage somebody, to look to you, Lord. What do I have to do? What do I need to do? Chapter 10, Solomon, that was him. The Queen of Sheba came 1500 miles to see what the Lord did in this man's life. And by the end of her visit, she's praising the Lord for doing what you know what he's done in Solomon's life. And then she's given Solomon all these all these wealth and everything, and he's given her stuff too. It's two rich people throwing money at each other, essentially. But you know, the the most important part of that conversation was her praising God. This person from a whole nother country praising God because of what he's done in Solomon's life. And then Solomon, the next chapter, talks about him loving strange women, many strange women, going outside of the commandments of God and doing whatever and being perverse and then you know, searching after these other gods and worshiping these other gods. Like, wait a minute, did you not see this God that gave you all this wisdom? You're the smartest man in the world, and you can't see not to do this. Let me put it this way: God brought you out of wherever he brought you from. He's done whatever he's done in your life, and you're gonna turn your back on him and go wherever else and do whatever else and serve whatever else when he's done so much for you. I'm no different than Solomon. I mean, we're all Solomon. Like it or not, we find ourselves Solomoning it up and doing whatever we want to. Because just like Solomon, we got a knack for putting ourselves on a pedestal when we never deserved it, but God does. He deserves it. Put him first, keep him at the forefront of your mind. Make a conscious effort every single day to put God first and watch him change your life. He's he's changed mine. Absolutely changed mine. Listen, I love you. God loves you. This has been the Unqualified Podcast with Leon Wilson.