SPEAKER_00: I want to read for you a few verses from first chapter, uh 1 Kings chapter 8.
SPEAKER_00: 1 Kings chapter 8, and I'm gonna read the first 11 verses of a very long chapter, and then we are gonna go into the word from there.
SPEAKER_00: You ready?
unknown: Good.
SPEAKER_00: First Kings chapter 8, verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: Then Solomon assembled the elders of Israel and all the heads of the tribes, the leaders of the fathers' houses of the people of Israel, before King Solomon in Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the covenant of the Lord out of the city of David, which is Zion.
SPEAKER_00: And all the men of Israel assembled to King Solomon at the feast in the month of Ethanim, which is the seventh month, and all the elders of Israel came, and the priests took up the ark, and they brought up the ark of the Lord, the tent of the meeting, and all the holy vessels that were in the tent.
SPEAKER_00: The priests and the Levites brought them up.
SPEAKER_00: And King Solomon and all the congregation of Israel who had assembled before him were with him before the ark, sacrificing so many sheep and oxen that they could not be counted or numbered.
SPEAKER_00: Then the priests brought the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord to its place in the inner sanctuary of the house, in the most holy place, underneath the wings of the cherubim.
SPEAKER_00: For the cherubim spread out their wings over the place of the ark, so that the cherubim overshadowed the ark and its poles.
SPEAKER_00: And the poles were so long that the ends of the poles were seen from the holy place before the inner sanctuary, but they could not be seen from outside, and they are there to this day.
SPEAKER_00: There was nothing in the ark except two tablets of stone that Moses put there at Horeb, where the Lord made a covenant with the people of Israel, and they came out of the land of Egypt.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 10.
SPEAKER_00: And when the priests came out, came out of the holy place, a cloud filled the house of the Lord, so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Let's stop there.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Father, I pray this morning, as we have read your word and will continue to read it this morning, that you would speak to each one of us individually and speak to us as a church family.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we approach your word not as a mere historical document, but the living embodiment of God, the truth of God, the life of God in these words for us here today, in this day and in this age.
SPEAKER_00: So, Father, this morning I submit myself to your word.
SPEAKER_00: I pray that each of us would submit ourselves to your word, that we would hear only what you want us to be heard, and we would respond likewise and act as those who have heard and encountered the living God.
SPEAKER_00: I pray this in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: The picture of the dedication of the temple of Solomon, the picture of the cloud descending, and the priests could not stand.
SPEAKER_00: It's a picture that has formed much of my hope and my expectation of what a corporate service could look like.
SPEAKER_00: What does it look like to stand in the presence of the Lord?
SPEAKER_00: I remember many years ago I was in London at the and I walked into St.
SPEAKER_00: Paul's Cathedral.
SPEAKER_00: Has anyone seen St.
SPEAKER_00: Paul's Cathedral in London?
SPEAKER_00: Oof, amazing.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's one of those buildings I walked into, and I don't know what it was, but I walked into it and was overwhelmed as you walked into the building.
SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't just the size, it wasn't just the beauty, it wasn't just the choir that started singing as we were walking around the building.
SPEAKER_00: There was something of uh, for me, it felt like God, the presence of God in that place.
SPEAKER_00: And I heard Goosey's just talking about it right now.
SPEAKER_00: Um, that the presence of God in that room, and I've wondered, it's been many years, uh, as I was awestruck in this building, and I've been in some incredible churches around the world.
SPEAKER_00: What was it?
SPEAKER_00: Was it the was it God's presence that had been acknowledged and worshipped there for so many hundreds of years?
SPEAKER_00: Was it the architecture?
SPEAKER_00: Was it emotion?
SPEAKER_00: Was it, I mean, something else?
SPEAKER_00: Um and I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: I I wonder what was that?
SPEAKER_00: But I don't think I'm alone in this.
SPEAKER_00: I I think each of us have a version of a moment like this where it's a building or it's a night of worship in the room, and you're you're wondering what was that feeling, what was that sense that I had as I walked in that place.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's a sunset on a camping trip, or you're sitting at the beach and you're you get overwhelmed with a feeling, a sense of awe, an ache for more.
SPEAKER_00: In December 2024, we watched as the Notre Dame was, Notre Dame, as they said in Paris, was was opened again after it was burnt in in 2019, I think it was.
SPEAKER_00: And we watched as the world was gathering, as the Parisians were gathering.
SPEAKER_00: And if you've been in France, you know it's mostly a godless country, no longer acknowledging the presence of the living God.
SPEAKER_00: But there, hundreds of people gathered, and the picture showed us people just crying and weeping at the at the beauty of the Notre Dame open again, and and and this longing to me was just so evident on our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: And I think we all still ache for this glory.
SPEAKER_00: We want God to show up.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, old philosopher Blaise Pascal talked about the hole in our hearts this way.
SPEAKER_00: He said, this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object, that is to say, God Himself.
SPEAKER_00: Others have summarized these words like this.
SPEAKER_00: They say, There's a God-shaped hole in each one of us, and a hole that only God can fill himself.
SPEAKER_00: But many of us are stuck in one of two places as we think about this ache.
SPEAKER_00: You know, some of us chase this feeling at one more conference, and then I can get my feels on, or one more worship night, or one more moment, and we we're chasing moments where we can feel and experience that ache being fulfilled.
SPEAKER_00: And others of us distrust the feeling.
SPEAKER_00: And you hear things like, well, was that God or was that the lighting?
SPEAKER_00: Was that God or was that the smoke cloud that that gets pumped into the room?
SPEAKER_00: And we wonder what was that feeling, that that sense that I couldn't explain, and we distrust what it is, but we have this relationship with this longing for God, for the glory of God, something deeper.
SPEAKER_00: But I want to show you what I believe this text is showing us today, is that that God wasn't after just visiting with his people, God was about moving in.
SPEAKER_00: He moved into a structure, he moved into a temple that was built for his name, and he showed that by his glory, the weight of his glory being uh evident, visible to all who saw.
SPEAKER_00: You see, there's a difference between a guest moving in or visiting and a resident moving in.
SPEAKER_00: There's a big difference.
SPEAKER_00: Kathy and I have hosted a number of people.
SPEAKER_00: It's one thing for a guest to come and there's a defined time and a defined hour, but when there's someone who moves in and you're there for a week or I think our longest is five months, there's something that that person can bring or not bring to the peace and the flow in your house.
SPEAKER_00: When someone moves in, there's a disruption.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes good, sometimes not so good.
SPEAKER_00: Let me set the scene for us.
SPEAKER_00: Alright, we're we've been talking about the dedication of the temple, and we are in a series called The Era of the Kings.
SPEAKER_00: If you are visiting with us, we have been slowly going through the Old Testament arc of the story, where we started the first few months of the year with Genesis, the creation, all the way through Abraham, and that was a very significant time in the story of God's dealing with these people.
SPEAKER_00: Then from April, May, June, we looked at the era of the patriarchs.
SPEAKER_00: We looked at Moses, we looked at Abraham and Jacob and Isaac, we look at Joseph, we looked at the time of the patriarchs and what that meant, and how each one of them, in a sense, was pointing us to the greater, to Jesus who was to come.
SPEAKER_00: We are now looking at the era of kings, starting with where Saul became the first human king over God's people.
SPEAKER_00: David last week, this week, looking briefly at Solomon next week again, and we're gonna look over the next few months at what happens when human kings took on a place that God wanted to take on himself.
SPEAKER_00: God wanted to be our king, and God is our king, but we're looking at the history of the Old Testament story.
SPEAKER_00: The last few months of the year, we're gonna look at an era in the history of God's people where they had no king, they had no patriarchs, they were prophets who kept trying to bring them back to God, leading all the way up to the coming of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: That's kind of where we are in our year.
SPEAKER_00: But here we are in the era of kings.
SPEAKER_00: This scene is around 959 BC, and it's the high point of Israel's entire Old Testament story, in a sense.
SPEAKER_00: David's son Solomon is king, the borders are secure.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon has finished the most expensive building project in all history of the Israel people.
SPEAKER_00: Seven years of work, gold-lined rooms, pretty much.
SPEAKER_00: It was an impressive, impressive building.
SPEAKER_00: He then schedules the inauguration of this building months after he finished it to coincide with a feast of tabernacles.
SPEAKER_00: The feast of tabernacles in the seventh month, that detail is given to us.
SPEAKER_00: It was the feast where Israel remembered the wilderness here.
SPEAKER_00: When God used to lead them through the wilderness, but he used to be in a tent amongst a people without a home.
SPEAKER_00: So the feast of tabernacles was to celebrate that, and at that feast, here we are, here is the physical building, the temple, and he wanted to do co-inside those together.
SPEAKER_00: This in itself is a statement that the God of the wandering tent is coming to rest.
SPEAKER_00: The God of a wandering tent is coming to establish, to uh inhabit a place and a people with a little bit more permanence.
SPEAKER_00: Another important context for us as we read this portion of scripture is that every other nation around Israel also built temples.
SPEAKER_00: But they built temples for their God, and mostly it was a containment system.
SPEAKER_00: It was a place where they fed their gods, a place where they would bow to their gods.
SPEAKER_00: Kathy and I were in Hong Kong, and we went to one of the Hindu temples, and you know, you you go and you see all these statues, and everybody would bring sacrifices and food and groceries and everything in their God, this contained area where they see God that way.
SPEAKER_00: So that was the picture that they were in.
SPEAKER_00: A temple, in a sense, was a containment system.
SPEAKER_00: Now, the same event I just read from 1 Kings chapter 8 is also recalled in 2 Chronicles chapter 7.
SPEAKER_00: Really fascinating to read this.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna read you the three verses from verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: As soon as Solomon finished his prayer, now the temple dedication happened, it's a long prayer that Solomon prayed.
SPEAKER_00: Soon as he finished his prayer, fire came down from heaven, says verse 1, and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the Lord filled the temple.
SPEAKER_00: And the priests could not enter the house of the Lord because the glory of the Lord had filled the Lord's house.
SPEAKER_00: When all the people of Israel saw the fire come down and the glory of the Lord on the temple, they bowed down with their faces to the ground on the pavement and worshiped and gave thanks to the Lord, saying, For he is good and his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: For he is good and his steadfast loves uh love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: I want to look at three movements through the story today.
SPEAKER_00: Let's start with how God moves in to the temple.
SPEAKER_00: In a sense, we're gonna unpack a little bit of Solomon's prayer that he prays at the dedication, and then we're gonna look at what happened after.
SPEAKER_00: What happened after the glory of the Lord came, how everything stopped and the Lord established himself there.
SPEAKER_00: So let's start at the beginning.
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't just visit, friends, he moves in.
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't just visit, he moves in.
SPEAKER_00: The scene that we're looking at is this deliberate replay of something we saw in Exodus chapter 40.
SPEAKER_00: The cloud descended on the mountain, the glory fills, and the minister can't work.
SPEAKER_00: We've seen this before.
SPEAKER_00: In the tabernacle, in the tent, it's the same kind of picture we've been noticing.
SPEAKER_00: But the one difference is that was a tent, this is a house.
SPEAKER_00: A tent is where you live in when you're moving around or you're crazy and have crazy hobbies.
SPEAKER_00: You campers.
SPEAKER_00: Um a house is what you live in when you've arrived and something's been established.
SPEAKER_00: And God is making a statement with this, friends.
SPEAKER_00: It's that He is not passing through, He is staying.
SPEAKER_00: The Hebrew word for the word glory, the cloud, the glory of the Lord was visible.
SPEAKER_00: The Hebrew word there is kavod, uh, k-a-v-r-d.
SPEAKER_00: It means weight in a sense, it means heaviness.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps when you think of the word glory, you think, you know, light and shining or something you'd see, but in the Hebrew sense, it wasn't that, it was a weight, uh a heaviness that came down upon the temple, so much so that the priest could not stand in the weight of the glory of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: The Hebrew means something, uh it means something you'd feel.
SPEAKER_00: There is a mass to it.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 11 says the priest could not stand.
SPEAKER_00: So that's what it is.
SPEAKER_00: So when we pray for the glory of the Lord in this church, we've got to understand what we're asking for.
SPEAKER_00: When we pray for the glory of the Lord to come, the presence of the Lord to come, we're not praying for a vibe to happen or uh uh a feeling, uh an ambience.
SPEAKER_00: We're praying for the weight of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes when you and I have an encounter with the Lord and we have a revelation of who the Lord is, sometimes you lose words.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what to say.
SPEAKER_00: How do I describe this?
SPEAKER_00: There's a weight, there's a seriousness of seeing and knowing and understanding the glory of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Now we may not see this cloud much or ever, and I'm praying for it.
SPEAKER_00: I want to see this cloud, but just because we don't see it doesn't mean the presence of the Lord isn't here.
SPEAKER_00: Even seeing the cloud at a dedication like this was pretty rare in the Old Testament story.
SPEAKER_00: It showed up at the inaugurations at the beginning, even in the New Testament.
SPEAKER_00: You saw uh the tongues of fire coming down on the men and women in Acts chapter 2 as they were waiting in the upper room.
SPEAKER_00: It's rare to see that.
SPEAKER_00: You can see, but it's very rare.
SPEAKER_00: But what's not rare is what happens when he moves in.
SPEAKER_00: His presence now is in that place.
SPEAKER_00: A tangible sense of God being there, and so we shouldn't confuse the ribbon-cutting ceremony with whether he's occupied the place or not.
SPEAKER_00: Just because we don't see the cloud every day doesn't mean he's not here.
SPEAKER_00: Doesn't mean he's not here.
SPEAKER_00: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_00: And this should change the way we see our lives.
SPEAKER_00: Because I believe most of us, or many of us, treat God as a guest.
SPEAKER_00: We treat the the fact that God meets with his people like a guest appearance.
SPEAKER_00: I go to church and maybe we're there for 90 minutes, and there I can have an encounter with God.
SPEAKER_00: I can meet with this guest in my life.
SPEAKER_00: Or I have a really good playlist for when I'm feeling down and I put my worship playlist on, and now I'm just visiting with God again as a guest.
SPEAKER_00: Whereas what God wants to do, and he's showing us through this, is he's not wanting or waiting to arrive in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Friends, he's waiting to be noticed, he's waiting to be acknowledged as already moved in to your house.
SPEAKER_00: If you are a child of God, if you have given your life to Jesus, the Spirit of God is in you.
SPEAKER_00: And what this picture is showing us is in a very, very temple-building kind of sense, is that God wants to be in there and is in there.
SPEAKER_00: He dedicated it, he's in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Can you and I begin to learn how to acknowledge it?
SPEAKER_00: Recognize it, know that he has taken up residence in his life.
SPEAKER_00: This, I believe, is the big question for us today.
SPEAKER_00: Are you aware of his presence?
SPEAKER_00: Do you know he lives in you?
SPEAKER_00: Do we understand the significance of a picture 3,000 years ago versus a reality today?
SPEAKER_00: Do we know what that picture is showing us about what your life should look like in 2026?
SPEAKER_00: Second thing I'm looking at through this scripture is this fact that it's actually a question.
SPEAKER_00: Can God be contained in a house?
SPEAKER_00: We saw the image of this temple being built.
SPEAKER_00: The nations around them built uh temples to contain their gods and to have a location.
SPEAKER_00: But here at the inauguration of the most expensive building project, Solomon himself says this in 1 Kings chapter 8, verse 27.
SPEAKER_00: He says this, but will God indeed dwell on the earth?
SPEAKER_00: Question mark.
SPEAKER_00: Behold, heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you.
SPEAKER_00: How much less this house that I've built?
SPEAKER_00: Think about that.
SPEAKER_00: Seven years he built this building, seven years he prepared a place, he was fulfilling the dream his dad had, David had, to build a house for the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And he's doing it, and he's doing at the ribbon-cutting ceremony.
SPEAKER_00: He's like, I don't, you're not gonna fit.
SPEAKER_00: Can this building contain you?
SPEAKER_00: Of course not.
SPEAKER_00: The heavens are your home, the earth is your footstool.
SPEAKER_00: So, what are we doing here?
SPEAKER_00: In a sense, and we've got to realize that this house cannot hold him.
SPEAKER_00: He then starts his prayer.
SPEAKER_00: So we read the first 11 verses.
SPEAKER_00: He then starts the dedication of the temple, the glory of the Lord comes down, and here Solomon begins to pray.
SPEAKER_00: And he's praying for 66 verses.
SPEAKER_00: This whole chapter is long.
SPEAKER_00: Over 30 to 40 verses, he is praying a prayer to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And in this prayer, he's listing seven petitions to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Why this is interesting and actually really important, go find this.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to go read this chapter today when you leave here.
SPEAKER_00: Each of the seven petitions, in the middle of the petition, he says something like this: then here in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, he says it exactly the same way, then here in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: Go find those seven petitions.
SPEAKER_00: When we have war and we're struggling, then here in heaven and he asks the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: When when we sin and we fall short, then here in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: If famine happens in our land, then here in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: He's acknowledging the home and the place of God is in the heavens, the omnipresence of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: But from the place of the temple where they meet with the Lord, and the ark is and the tablets are, from there they are praying.
SPEAKER_00: In a sense, this has become a house of prayer for the nations.
SPEAKER_00: Without saying those words, he has seven different prayers.
SPEAKER_00: He's praying what happens in defeat, what happens in war, what happens in sin.
SPEAKER_00: He even prays at the seventh one.
SPEAKER_00: What happens when we're in exile?
SPEAKER_00: In a sense, a foreshadowing, knowing this is coming, because for hundreds of years the whole nation of Israel was in exile.
SPEAKER_00: They were wondering.
SPEAKER_00: He says, When we're in exile, will you hear from heaven?
SPEAKER_00: Will you hear from heaven?
SPEAKER_00: Will you answer this?
SPEAKER_00: The house of the Lord is the place of prayer for the people and for the nations.
SPEAKER_00: See, Solomon now builds his house that the card of the heaven, it can't contain him.
SPEAKER_00: But from that place, a falling people, a failing people who go through sin and famine and wars and exile can come and have an address.
SPEAKER_00: That's what this building is.
SPEAKER_00: It's not a box for God, friends, it's address for you and I.
SPEAKER_00: For the day the crops die, they can come and pray to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: For the day that we blow it, we can come into the place where the presence of the Lord is.
SPEAKER_00: The uncontainable God made himself addressable in this picture.
SPEAKER_00: At the center of this petition, verse 41.
SPEAKER_00: If you're in 1 Kings 18, uh 8, verse 41 to 43, let me paraphrase.
SPEAKER_00: A little bit.
SPEAKER_00: He says, likewise, when a foreigner who is not of your people Israel comes from a far country because of your name, hear in heaven, your dwelling place, in order that all the people of the earth may know your name.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that cool?
SPEAKER_00: It's like he's praying 614's vision statement.
SPEAKER_00: Until everyone knows Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Say that with me.
SPEAKER_00: He's praying, look at this.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, when a foreigner, foreigner, non-Israelite, comes to your people from a far country because of your name, here in heaven, your dwelling place, in order that all the peoples of the earth may know your name.
SPEAKER_00: In order that everyone who knows Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Friends, his presence was never just for the room.
SPEAKER_00: His presence was for the healing of the nations.
SPEAKER_00: His presence was to be a place of intercession for those who don't yet know.
SPEAKER_00: Now, some of you may be thinking, well, if God is everywhere, well, why gather?
SPEAKER_00: Why gather in a building?
SPEAKER_00: Why pray at all if God is everywhere, which we're seeing here?
SPEAKER_00: And here's my short answer is because you're not a ghost.
SPEAKER_00: You are a body.
SPEAKER_00: Make sense?
SPEAKER_00: You're a quiet crowd today.
SPEAKER_00: You're not a, you're you're a spiritual being, but in this earth, you're a body.
SPEAKER_00: We need a gathering.
SPEAKER_00: We need a place to come.
SPEAKER_00: We need rhythms.
SPEAKER_00: We need uh places, we need addresses.
SPEAKER_00: God's answer to being everywhere wasn't so that wasn't so that it doesn't matter where you are.
SPEAKER_00: His answer to being everywhere is so I can meet you where you are.
SPEAKER_00: I can meet you.
SPEAKER_00: And we as a church believe in the gathering of the saints, in rhythms of praying together, in rhythms of worshiping together.
SPEAKER_00: In Hebrews, the writer says, Don't neglect the gathering of the saints.
SPEAKER_00: Why is there this rhythm of coming together weekly and meeting in this room?
SPEAKER_00: It's not like on the checklist, it's so that we can come and pray together and minister to the Lord and be encouraged together and learn and grow together.
SPEAKER_00: God's presence isn't primarily something you feel, it's someone you address.
SPEAKER_00: The presence of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Now I want us to look at one more thing here.
SPEAKER_00: When God fills the house, things stop and people change.
SPEAKER_00: When God fills this house, look at what happens here.
SPEAKER_00: 2 Chronicles chapter 7 tells us that the priest, verse 2, the priest could not enter the house of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: The priest could not enter the house of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: The professionals stopped doing work.
SPEAKER_00: They stopped ministering.
SPEAKER_00: They were unable to.
SPEAKER_00: The trained ministers because God was in the way.
SPEAKER_00: Another thing that happens, look at verse 3.
SPEAKER_00: They fall face down on the pavement and they say something.
SPEAKER_00: They weren't like, oh, that was a great experience, or that was awesome.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, what a night.
SPEAKER_00: They say he is good and his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: The real glory in experiencing and knowing the glory of the Lord produces a posture of being face down before the Lord and a truth, a declaration of who God is.
SPEAKER_00: When we feel and know and understand the weight of the Lord, it leads us to be a worshiping people.
SPEAKER_00: The mark of God's presence in this text is that the professionals got interrupted.
SPEAKER_00: Now, this this thought has been sitting with me all week long.
SPEAKER_00: We love ambiance.
SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean when I say that?
SPEAKER_00: Like we love to worship together.
SPEAKER_00: We we have a worship team that's so well trained, and just, I mean, it's like angels singing every week.
SPEAKER_00: Can I have a witness?
SPEAKER_00: You know, and it's beautiful.
SPEAKER_00: We we love good sounds.
SPEAKER_00: We have this guitar.
SPEAKER_00: You should see this pedal over here.
SPEAKER_00: There's like 17 computers just built in here.
SPEAKER_00: We like nice sounds, and this is a keyboard, it's called a Nord.
SPEAKER_00: We have a saying that where the Nord is, the Lord is, you know.
SPEAKER_00: It has the most beautiful sound.
SPEAKER_00: We love to create an atmosphere.
SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00: When Kathy and I host people at our house, we we want to create an atmosphere where if you're visiting us, you're feeling welcome.
SPEAKER_00: So we put some nice music on, the candles are burning, Kathy's got this food going, and there's an atmosphere when you walk in, the dogs have been exiled outside because you know we want you to come in and experience it.
SPEAKER_00: The problem is when we get so good at it that we begin to confuse the Nord for the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: See what I did there?
SPEAKER_00: I just came to me right now.
SPEAKER_00: It just it just there was like a download from the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: We we confuse our excellent music for presence.
SPEAKER_00: Some churches put some smoke machines in.
SPEAKER_00: We confuse the smoke machine for the glory of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: We confuse being so good and so professional at a great service with when the presence of the Lord actually came, the professionals couldn't even do their work.
SPEAKER_00: Now we've got to ask ourselves a question: are we so good at doing church and doing our services that we're uninterruptible with the actual weighty presence of the Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Is our program, our our schedule, is it is it interruptible so that when the glory of the Lord wants to appear and do something, we're not interrupted, we're yielded.
SPEAKER_00: We've got to ask ourselves this question.
SPEAKER_00: This is a picture this story shows me.
SPEAKER_00: Charles Spurgeon in 1860, uh, the weekly opened their own church building.
SPEAKER_00: He prayed, he preached on this text.
SPEAKER_00: But he said this: he said, let the Lord fill the house and man will be forgotten.
SPEAKER_00: Let the Lord fill the house and man will be forgotten.
SPEAKER_00: We've got to ask ourselves, are we getting so good at creating environments at the expense of the true authentic encounter with the Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Our team have to ask us, our worship team have to ask it, our preachers have to ask it, you have to ask it.
SPEAKER_00: Are you looking for the feels?
SPEAKER_00: Are you looking for the weights, the glory of the Lord to come in and take residence and maybe interrupt your life just a little bit?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe interrupt the way you treat one another, maybe interrupt the way you live your sexuality, maybe interrupt the way you live your finances.
SPEAKER_00: Is the Lord the Lord the glory of the Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Does he have access in your life?
SPEAKER_00: Or are we looking for a drive-by blessing?
SPEAKER_00: The glory of the Lord in my scripture is showing me it's everything.
SPEAKER_00: Everything stopped.
SPEAKER_00: Everything stopped, and people are changed.
SPEAKER_00: So we've got to ask this question.
SPEAKER_00: How, maybe you're asking this question, how do I know the moments in the room is God and not just the music or the lights or the crowd?
SPEAKER_00: And I believe that's the right question.
SPEAKER_00: We can get good at manufacturing moments.
SPEAKER_00: Crowds can be a manufacturing of moments.
SPEAKER_00: Michael Jackson manufactured moments where those girls were crying like little babies.
SPEAKER_00: You know?
SPEAKER_00: There were moments.
SPEAKER_00: Taylor Swift has is really good and a billionaire because she creates moments in her concerts.
SPEAKER_00: But they're not transformative.
SPEAKER_00: They're a blessing, they're fun.
SPEAKER_00: Taylor Swift, but you know.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the test that the church has used for centuries.
SPEAKER_00: The mark of a real encounter with God is never the intensity in the room, it's the difference that's been made in your life on a Tuesday.
SPEAKER_00: Manufactured moments will fade tomorrow.
SPEAKER_00: But a true residence comes in, is going to start disrupting the things in your life in the best possible way.
SPEAKER_00: A resident moving in.
SPEAKER_00: It's the atmosphere in your house, in your heart.
SPEAKER_00: We started this song, very first song today.
SPEAKER_00: If you remember the words we sang, everything changed.
SPEAKER_00: It's getting harder to recognize the person I was before I encountered Christ.
SPEAKER_00: He's talking about this idea the longer I'm walking with the Lord, things in my life are beginning to shift and adjust, and attitudes and heart posture and loneliness I used to feel, and depression.
SPEAKER_00: And as things are beginning to change, because when the residence, the glory of the Lord comes in, it has to change.
SPEAKER_00: A blessing can uh improve maybe your life, but leaves.
SPEAKER_00: But as a residence, changes and stays.
SPEAKER_00: So I have to ask this question again.
SPEAKER_00: Did we feel something?
SPEAKER_00: And if we felt something, what is different about me?
SPEAKER_00: Because he now lives in me.
SPEAKER_00: What is different?
SPEAKER_00: You and I live in Columbus, Ohio, maybe Cincinnati, Cleveland, wherever you come from.
SPEAKER_00: We're very, very far from Solomon's temple.
SPEAKER_00: Very far from understanding that.
SPEAKER_00: So now what?
SPEAKER_00: Well, actually, Solomon's temple actually got ruined 400 years later.
SPEAKER_00: So it's not there anymore.
SPEAKER_00: So what does it mean for us today?
SPEAKER_00: Well, a thousand years later, John writes this about Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: John chapter 1, verse 14.
SPEAKER_00: If you're gonna write anything down, it's the next two verses I'm gonna read.
SPEAKER_00: 1 John 1, verse 14.
SPEAKER_00: And the word became flesh and dwelt amongst us.
SPEAKER_00: And we have seen his glory.
SPEAKER_00: Think of the word glory.
SPEAKER_00: We've seen his glory.
SPEAKER_00: Glory as the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
SPEAKER_00: John used this word for dwelt, which literally means tabernacled.
SPEAKER_00: The word became flesh and tabernacled amongst us.
SPEAKER_00: He pitched his tent.
SPEAKER_00: The glory that filled the house of Solomon is the glory that has come to live amongst us when Jesus was on the earth.
SPEAKER_00: The glory of the Lord, and they had seen the glory of the Lord because they had seen Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: They'd seen the weight, the the measure of God because they saw Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said it out loud, he said, destroy the temple and in three days I'll raise it up.
SPEAKER_00: He he tells us how he was talking about his body.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus on earth, we're going from the temple, the glory of the Lord in the temple, to the glory of the Lord on the person of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Destroy the temple and in three days he'll come up.
SPEAKER_00: He was killed on the cross and three days later rose up.
SPEAKER_00: The glory of the Lord came out, and the glory of the Lord told us, wait for the coming of the Holy Spirit, wait in the upper room.
SPEAKER_00: It's very, very significant for you and I in Columbus, Ohio.
SPEAKER_00: 50 days later, after Jesus rose from the grave, they're standing in the upper room, and the Spirit of God comes down on them like tongues of fire.
SPEAKER_00: The Spirit of God, the glory of the Lord descended on everyday believers, 120 of them in the room, and they encountered the living God who came in them and on them.
SPEAKER_00: And the presence of God, glory of the Lord in Solomon's temple, glory of the Lord seen in Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Now in human beings, you and I are now carriers of the glory of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: God with us, tabernacle moving into our lives.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't this great news?
SPEAKER_00: Isn't it great news?
SPEAKER_00: The glory of the Lord that they could not do it, they could not do it.
SPEAKER_00: That glory is in your life.
SPEAKER_00: That presence of God, that very God, but we don't live like it.
SPEAKER_00: I don't live like it.
SPEAKER_00: So often I'm just thinking it's me.
SPEAKER_00: I've got to make this happen.
SPEAKER_00: I've got to move forward.
SPEAKER_00: I've got to find the answer.
SPEAKER_00: I've got to find peace.
SPEAKER_00: I'm dealing with anxiety.
SPEAKER_00: I'm sad about the situation.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm dealing, dealing, dealing, not recognizing the glory of the Lord, the weight of the Lord is He's in me.
SPEAKER_00: And what am I gonna do about it?
SPEAKER_00: God isn't waiting to be welcomed in, He's waiting to be acknowledged.
SPEAKER_00: Call on Him.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, here's the other verse.
SPEAKER_00: Are you okay?
SPEAKER_00: You with me?
SPEAKER_00: This is so good.
SPEAKER_00: This is so important.
SPEAKER_00: 1 Corinthians 3 verse 16.
SPEAKER_00: Paul writes this to the Corinthians church.
SPEAKER_00: Please hear this as if you're hearing this for yourself directly from God.
SPEAKER_00: Do you not know that you are God's temple?
SPEAKER_00: Who here is thinking this is for somebody next to them?
SPEAKER_00: Subconsciously, I think many of us think, whoa, one day I'm gonna be that good.
SPEAKER_00: One day I'm gonna be ready.
SPEAKER_00: One day I'm gonna be holy enough.
SPEAKER_00: He is talking to everyday believers.
SPEAKER_00: If you look at the first Corinthian church, they were a hot mess.
SPEAKER_00: That's who Paul is speaking to.
SPEAKER_00: Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you?
SPEAKER_00: If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him.
SPEAKER_00: For God's temple is holy, and you are that temple.
SPEAKER_00: As much as we were talking about Solomon's temple, personalize it.
SPEAKER_00: This is who he describes you as the temple of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And the glory of the Lord, the holy presence of the Lord is in you, is with you.
SPEAKER_00: Friends, this is so important.
SPEAKER_00: The glory is not behind, left behind in Solomon's temple.
SPEAKER_00: It's not ahead and some revival.
SPEAKER_00: You and I have to go wait and try and catch.
SPEAKER_00: God's glory didn't retire, it moved in.
SPEAKER_00: It moved into our lives.
SPEAKER_00: He came to dwell and transform, not to visit and bless.
SPEAKER_00: Now, can we learn to be aware of this fact in our daily lives?
SPEAKER_00: Prince, for a minute here, please.
SPEAKER_00: I'm struggling with words for this.
SPEAKER_00: But the holy presence of God, the weighty glory of the Lord, is in you.
SPEAKER_00: But we treat him with such discontent.
SPEAKER_00: We put things in our body as if we are the owner of our body, when we are a temple for his presence.
SPEAKER_00: We put things before our eyes like it doesn't actually matter, like it doesn't actually grieve the Spirit of God that is living in you, and we think we're just indulging in what I like and what gives me peace.
SPEAKER_00: We are we are defiling what God wants to do in your life, the holy presence of God.
SPEAKER_00: We have sex with whoever we think and who we want, and we think that we can just do what makes us feel good.
SPEAKER_00: When we, if you are a child of God, if you have given your life to Jesus, you are a carrier of the His words says you are a temple.
SPEAKER_00: You are a temple, you are a temple of the Spirit of God.
SPEAKER_00: That's the weight of this.
SPEAKER_00: That's the weight of the invitation.
SPEAKER_00: That's the weight of the Holy Spirit in you.
SPEAKER_00: It's the presence of God with you.
SPEAKER_00: Now, can you and I learn how to acknowledge his presence every day?
SPEAKER_00: When lost of you, asked him.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, I go through the motions, but I want to be I want to know your presence in this way.
SPEAKER_00: I want to know your presence with me as a policeman, as a fireman.
SPEAKER_00: I want to know your presence as a construction worker.
SPEAKER_00: I want to know your presence as a student.
SPEAKER_00: I want to know your presence as a husband or a wife or or I have these crazy parents.
SPEAKER_00: How do I know your presence when I'm going through difficult things?
SPEAKER_00: How do I know your presence?
SPEAKER_00: How can I be aware of this fact?
SPEAKER_00: The word of the Lord is truth.
SPEAKER_00: How can I become aware of it?
SPEAKER_00: Friends, this is the this is the exercise for us today.
SPEAKER_00: Can we become aware of his presence?
SPEAKER_00: I want to ask you.
SPEAKER_00: I don't want to have the band up right now.
SPEAKER_00: I don't want the ministry team up right now.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we can even use these ambiance sitters and these wonderful people who pray with us as a crutch when you are, you are a child of God.
SPEAKER_00: And his spirit is in you.
SPEAKER_00: Can I ask us for just a few minutes?
SPEAKER_00: I know I've gone a little bit long today.
SPEAKER_00: Are you okay?
SPEAKER_00: Can we just become aware of his presence?
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to ask you to close your eyes for no other reason than to just help you with distraction.
SPEAKER_00: For me, I look around, I get distracted, and I'm seeing the beautiful windows, and I'm seeing my friends, I get distracted.
SPEAKER_00: Just close your eyes for a second.
SPEAKER_00: And will you just begin to engage with the Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Friends, I try to read for you as much scripture as I could to try to show you this is not my opinion of what the presence of the Lord looks like, what the glory of the Lord looks like.
SPEAKER_00: This is the word of God for you and I.
SPEAKER_00: I'll just begin to speak to him.
SPEAKER_00: If you don't know how to do that, honestly, God is a He's a He's a being who wants to be heard and He wants to be talked to.
SPEAKER_00: Just begin to talk to him like he would talk to your mother, like you would talk to your friend.
SPEAKER_00: Allow me to speak over some of you.
SPEAKER_00: If I'm distracting you, I'm sorry, but just keep talking to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: But there's some people in this room you've never become, you've never been aware of God's presence in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Every eye still closed.
SPEAKER_00: I want to ask you, just begin to ask, tell him, tell him that.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, I I don't think I've ever been aware of your presence.
SPEAKER_00: I would really like to be.
SPEAKER_00: Would you would you fill me again?
SPEAKER_00: Would you refresh me?
SPEAKER_00: Would you make me aware of your presence?
SPEAKER_00: For some of you, you need to do something to respond to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: If you need to stand, I'm gonna encourage you to do that.
SPEAKER_00: If you need to say, Lord, that's me, I want to respond to you.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps you should stand, perhaps you should kneel.
SPEAKER_00: Just keep talking to him.
SPEAKER_00: Because other people in this room, you've experienced so much of the dark side of life.
SPEAKER_00: In a sense, life has been knocked being knocked out of you.
SPEAKER_00: And you're in such a desperate need to know the comfort and the presence of the Lord again.
SPEAKER_00: Friends, just asking.
SPEAKER_00: Just ask him.
SPEAKER_00: Would you feel me again?
SPEAKER_00: I just sent in prayer this morning that there was some people sitting here with such wounds of what others have done to you.
SPEAKER_00: And they did it.
SPEAKER_00: They did bad things.
SPEAKER_00: They said bad things.
SPEAKER_00: They they cut you out, they offended you.
SPEAKER_00: And as a result, you started building some sort of a wall around your heart to protect yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Feel the Lord saying that wall you built is keeping him out as well.
SPEAKER_00: And if you would just begin one by one to forgive those people, forgive what they said, forgive what they did.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't make that right, but it sets you free and it gives you access to know and experience the presence of God again.
SPEAKER_00: Would you begin that painful process sometimes of letting it go?
SPEAKER_00: Of letting it go into God's hands.
SPEAKER_00: Just keep talking to the Father.
SPEAKER_00: And then there are some people in this room.
SPEAKER_00: You've never given your life to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: You've never surrendered to him.
SPEAKER_00: And everything I just said, friends, is yours through faith in Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: He is the way.
SPEAKER_00: He is the door.
SPEAKER_00: He is the truth.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible tells us if you believe in your heart that Jesus is Lord, and you genuinely want Him to be the Lord of your life, and you confess it, He says, You're saved.
SPEAKER_00: You're saved.
SPEAKER_00: He gives you a new heart.
SPEAKER_00: He gives you eternity with him as a reward.
SPEAKER_00: Now every eye is still closed, but I'd like to pray with you.
SPEAKER_00: If you've not given your life to Jesus, I'm just going to lead you through a prayer of acknowledgement, of repentance, and surrender to him.
SPEAKER_00: If that's you, would you raise your hand so I know who I'm praying with?
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
SPEAKER_00: Very brave of you.
SPEAKER_00: Is there anybody else?
SPEAKER_00: Let me give you another minute.
SPEAKER_00: Is there anybody else who wants to take this big step of following Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: Alright, pray with me.
SPEAKER_00: And if you're in this room and you have never prayed this before, feel free to pray this with me.
SPEAKER_00: Say, dear Jesus, I believe you are the Son of God.
SPEAKER_00: And I want to surrender my life to you.
SPEAKER_00: Will you forgive me of my sins?
SPEAKER_00: I receive your forgiveness.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, I want to follow you.
SPEAKER_00: Will you help me?
SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Someone's gonna come and sit with you and talk with you as well, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Guys, can we stand for a minute?
SPEAKER_00: Normally we got songs going, and we got this.
SPEAKER_00: Fabian, can you lead us in a song again?
SPEAKER_00: Let's just have some words to acknowledge Jesus again as we worship him and we go from here.
SPEAKER_00: And we would consciously acknowledge the presence of God on Tuesday, on Wednesday, on Friday, in your high and in your low.
SPEAKER_00: Can we honor the Lord by acknowledging that he's there and asking him daily to know his presence, to know his help, to know his word.
SPEAKER_00: May the Lord bless you today.
SPEAKER_00: May he keep you.
SPEAKER_00: May he make his face to shine upon you.
SPEAKER_00: I pray as you go from here, you would walk out, showing the love of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.