SPEAKER_00: You're listening to the road by Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.
SPEAKER_01: Men and women, God's heart is for our cities.
SPEAKER_01: God's heart is for individuals, those who mourn, those who are brokenhearted, those who've been betrayed, those who've been ripped off, and everybody in this room, you've experienced a little of that, have you not?
SPEAKER_01: You've been hurt at your job, you've been hurt at school, you've been bullied.
SPEAKER_01: There's been all these things that have happened in our life that we carry within us, and only Jesus says, I came to set you free.
SPEAKER_01: I came to heal that broken heart that you have.
SPEAKER_00: At The Road, our vision is to raise up wholehearted disciples of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: For more information on The Road, visit theroad.org.
SPEAKER_00: We hope you are encouraged by today's message from Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.
SPEAKER_01: So it's pretty cold this morning out where I live.
SPEAKER_01: It was two degrees.
SPEAKER_01: Currently it's three degrees in Black Forest.
SPEAKER_01: So I just thought it was appropriate for all of you that I tell a few jokes.
SPEAKER_01: These are cold weather jokes.
SPEAKER_01: The optometrist is giving away free ice scrapers with his eyeglasses.
SPEAKER_01: Politicians have their hands in their own pockets.
SPEAKER_01: Squirrels in the park are throwing themselves against the electric fence.
SPEAKER_01: Dogs are wearing cats.
SPEAKER_01: I like that one.
SPEAKER_01: When we milk the cows, we got ice cream.
SPEAKER_01: I've heard that one for years.
SPEAKER_01: That's not that funny.
SPEAKER_01: We didn't clean the house, we defrosted it.
SPEAKER_01: And the best one is you have to kick a hole in the air just to get outside.
SPEAKER_01: All right.
SPEAKER_01: We're doing something a little different today, and because it's a it's a, I don't know, like half our church is here, we may have to continue aspects of it next week.
SPEAKER_01: But I want to talk about the vision and the mission that God's given us here at the church.
SPEAKER_01: And if you look onto the right and to the left, you're gonna see some banners with days of the week.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm gonna be talking about what it means to be a kingdom revolution watchman.
SPEAKER_01: What it means to be a prayer warrior for a kingdom revolution.
SPEAKER_01: So our vision is bringing a kingdom revolution to the Rockies, and we believe that that, and I'm gonna explain in a moment what that means, that God actually wants to use our church to not just bring revival and not be a part of revival.
SPEAKER_01: Those are normally short-lived.
SPEAKER_01: If you look at all the great revivals in history, they last for at the most a couple years.
SPEAKER_01: To me, a revival is more like a spark plug that fires up the engine.
SPEAKER_01: The problem with revivals is rarely does the revival itself carry itself into the rest of society because a revival by its very nature is to revive something that's already there.
SPEAKER_01: So revival by its very nature is for the church.
SPEAKER_01: The church gets revived.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm for revival, but not just for a revival, but a revival that would actually lead to a revolution.
SPEAKER_01: An example of that would be the Protestant Revolution, the Protestant Reformation, which has now been 500 years and is still impacting us today because of what Luther did and then the reformationists of that time did all through Europe.
SPEAKER_01: Another example is the American Revolution.
SPEAKER_01: The American Revolution has built, in my opinion, and some would differ, the greatest nation and the greatest political system the world has ever seen.
SPEAKER_01: Now, there's forces out right now doing all that they can to dismantle it and destroy it.
SPEAKER_01: And the reason there's that mindset is because we give freedom for people to dismantle and destroy, right?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, in many cases, in most nations, if you said some of the things that are being said on the political scene right now, you'd be jailed.
SPEAKER_01: But we don't believe in that.
SPEAKER_01: We don't believe in that kind of a system.
SPEAKER_01: And so because of that, we're the greatest nation in the world.
SPEAKER_01: We're the most open-minded.
SPEAKER_01: We're the most, uh, we give more people opportunity to do more stuff than any nation in the world.
SPEAKER_01: And I know I've been to 35 nations in the world, and I love coming home.
SPEAKER_01: I love coming back to the States.
SPEAKER_01: If you've never been out of the States and you're critical of our nation, one of the best things you could do is do it, do an save your money and go to China.
SPEAKER_01: Save your money and go into Europe.
SPEAKER_01: Save your money and go to uh anywhere in Africa.
SPEAKER_01: Save your money and go into India.
SPEAKER_01: Save your money and go into Indonesia, and you'll have a deep, deep, wonderful appreciation for our nation.
SPEAKER_01: So if you feel like that we're too constricted in our views, then take a trip and come back, and you'll realize, wow, this is the greatest, this really is the greatest nation on the globe.
SPEAKER_01: Now, let me just say this.
SPEAKER_01: When I say that, it doesn't mean that we should sit back and just act like that we figured it all out 250 years ago, and so all we're trying to do is perpetuate our own security.
SPEAKER_01: That's why we need a kingdom of God revolution, men and women.
SPEAKER_01: Because crime is at an all-time high.
SPEAKER_01: Some prejudicial aspects of our society are at all-time high.
SPEAKER_01: We're seeing our cities, the inner cities, crumble under gangs and heroin and cocaine.
SPEAKER_01: We in this nation have the greatest appetite for drugs than any nation in the world.
SPEAKER_01: That's a pretty major issue.
SPEAKER_01: And the right has answers that they feel like are right, and the left has answers that they feel like are right, and I believe that Jesus got it right.
SPEAKER_01: And that what we need today is not as much right or left, but a kingdom of God revolution.
SPEAKER_01: So we're trying to figure that out.
SPEAKER_01: We're trying to work that out.
SPEAKER_01: We're looking at Scripture and we're gonna study Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna go into Matthew.
SPEAKER_01: According to how time goes today and how things go today.
SPEAKER_01: We might be starting Matthew next week, and we're gonna look at a kingdom of God revolution for the next year.
SPEAKER_01: That's what we're gonna be talking about, going chapter by chapter and verse by verse through the book of Matthew.
SPEAKER_01: So that's the that's the vision of the road that we might be used of the Lord to ignite a kingdom of God revolution in the Rocky Mountains.
SPEAKER_01: We say, well, why not the whole world?
SPEAKER_01: Because the world's really big.
SPEAKER_01: And I believe that God plants all of us in certain places in our life at a certain location for a purpose.
SPEAKER_01: So I don't want to talk about exporting something that we haven't imported.
SPEAKER_01: So if we can't do it here, I don't care so much about what happens out there.
SPEAKER_01: Let them figure out out there.
SPEAKER_01: And what I mean by that is I'm a missiologist.
SPEAKER_01: That's my one of my graduate degrees is in missiology from the School of World Mission, Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California.
SPEAKER_01: I think one of the best mission-oriented schools in the world, for that matter.
SPEAKER_01: And we learned years ago, and then we did it with a group called Campus Crusade when I went to Japan for 10 years.
SPEAKER_01: Our job in Japan was to work ourselves out of a job.
SPEAKER_01: That we didn't go there.
SPEAKER_01: You're not even allowed in Campus Crusade to own any property or to set up any kind of an LLC or any kind of a nonprofit in another nation if you're on staff with them, because they don't want missionaries living there for the rest of their life.
SPEAKER_01: They want missionaries with Campus Crusade who raise up nationals who live there.
SPEAKER_01: It didn't take me but six months in language school to realize I'm never gonna be fluent in this language.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if you heard me say he's fluent in Japanese, uh-uh.
SPEAKER_01: Ask a Japanese if I'm fluent.
SPEAKER_01: He's horrible.
SPEAKER_01: Because God made Japanese people for Japan.
SPEAKER_01: He made the Chinese for China, He made Georgians for Colorado, He made um, but you hear what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_01: So when you look at even the book of Acts, you see that as they went to Antioch, and we'll we'll say in this case, it's like uh Barnabas and Paul are in Antioch, and then they're sent out from there, as they went, they raised up local elders and local deacons.
SPEAKER_01: There's always a place for missions, so don't get me wrong.
SPEAKER_01: God's called us to that.
SPEAKER_01: But I believe what we saw a hundred years ago in missions was the need, and I believe it was a need a hundred years ago, for apostle Paul's to leave, for example, the United States or Canada or a place like that and raise up Barnabases in those nations that supported them because they had absolutely no background in Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: But today we are Barnabases going out to raise up Paul's.
SPEAKER_01: There's a Pauline anointed man or woman in Indonesia.
SPEAKER_01: There's a Pauline man or woman in China.
SPEAKER_01: And when we go into those places, our job is to barnabase them, to encourage them and to raise them up.
SPEAKER_01: Why do I say all that?
SPEAKER_01: I say that because this is our territory.
SPEAKER_01: If you've chosen to live here and if you love this city like I do, then we want to make this the greatest city it can possibly be for the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_01: And we would be remiss if all we did was live in our own little bubble and our own little world and not care about our neighbors and not love them, not care about building companies and building businesses that actually go in and bring the kingdom there.
SPEAKER_01: We have so many people, you know, all across the country, because of the Christian nation traditionally that we are, that have the little ichthus on the back of the car and they're just as unscrupulous and dishonest as anybody else.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: I almost don't want to go on the yellow pages and see any kind of a little fishy.
SPEAKER_01: I just want somebody who'll show up on time and leave on time and give me a fair price.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: Well, what if, like they did with Vince on Saturday morning with the businessmen's uh breakfast that they had, and there were about 50 men and women there on businesses who came.
SPEAKER_01: We actually started making our secular environment sacred by bringing the kingdom of God into how we treat people, how we handle our money, how we love our neighbor as ourselves and what we do.
SPEAKER_01: That people would say, Oh, that's a guy from the road.
SPEAKER_01: That was a gal from the road.
SPEAKER_01: And we started getting a reputation that we do the best work, the most beautiful way, and we're scrupulously honest and with integrity and all that.
SPEAKER_01: That's a kingdom revolution.
SPEAKER_01: People start asking questions if you act like that because there are not many of them out there that act like that.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: And so it's a kingdom revolution.
SPEAKER_01: That's what we mean.
SPEAKER_01: In media, you guys, in the media realm, in computers, that's the future.
SPEAKER_01: That's a big chunk of the future.
SPEAKER_01: The best thing that you guys can do, even as you're learning the skill, the acquired skill, is that you're passionate about intimacy with Christ.
SPEAKER_01: That you're experiencing the presence of God, young people.
SPEAKER_01: You're exp, you're experiencing the presence of God, and you bring that into your arena as a missionary right there.
SPEAKER_01: Doesn't matter, it doesn't matter what part of the world you're in, it matters what you bring.
SPEAKER_01: And so David came, his media instrument was a harp, and he drove back demons in Saul's court because he was a man who had an intimate, passionate presence of God relationship with the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: So, how do we do that road mission?
SPEAKER_01: Our mission is empowering people to change the world.
SPEAKER_01: Empowering people.
SPEAKER_01: So here at the road, you're gonna see classes through OU, uh, Outlaw University, and all the different classes.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna keep introducing constantly new classes to empower, equip, and build you to be kingdom revolutionaries.
SPEAKER_01: Starting in your own heart.
SPEAKER_01: So when you came in, you got a card.
SPEAKER_01: Did everybody get a card?
SPEAKER_01: When you came in the door, we'll talk about that in a moment.
SPEAKER_01: You can just put it down, but we'll talk about that in a second about being a watchman.
SPEAKER_01: So, do you guys want to do this?
SPEAKER_01: Because if you don't, you you you need to go to another church.
SPEAKER_01: Because, like I said, for the next year, I'm gonna be talking a lot about it.
SPEAKER_01: And if you're not excited about it, then ask God to get you excited because it's biblical.
SPEAKER_01: You know, we've got, I know there's one guy running for president, um, and he's gonna be running for president.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Well, I don't he says, I don't really like the Constitution of the United States.
SPEAKER_01: I think we should just change it all.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, seriously, folks, there's some nuts out there.
SPEAKER_01: I'm from Georgia, I'm not real smart, but we usually we call them there, we call them weirdos.
SPEAKER_01: So there's weirdos out there.
SPEAKER_01: But this is our constitution, this is our main constitution right here.
SPEAKER_01: Now, granted, everybody, you know, in different denominations, different groups interpret it differently, but on the main things of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we can have unity there.
SPEAKER_01: We can stand shoulder to shoulder with others on those things.
SPEAKER_01: Now, some people dunk them when it's baptism time, some people sprinkle them, sometimes they do it as an infant, sometimes they do it as a believer, some different views on the when Christ is coming back.
SPEAKER_01: I don't care.
SPEAKER_01: Honestly.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I care about how we do it, but I don't care how they do it.
SPEAKER_01: If we can agree on the unity of the basics and the most important foundational principles of this book, we're on the same team.
SPEAKER_01: I'm wearing the same jersey.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: Everybody go like that, okay.
SPEAKER_01: Because if you because that's the way I may be a little too inclusive for some, but I have grown to believe, because I grew up Lutheran, and man, the Lutherans do it a lot different than we do here, but I love my Lutheran uh background.
SPEAKER_01: I love my Lutheran heritage.
SPEAKER_01: It was beautiful, it was wonderful, it was awesome.
SPEAKER_01: And some of you come out of Catholic backgrounds and Methodist backgrounds and Calvary Chapel backgrounds and whatever it might be, it's all great.
SPEAKER_01: It's just different ways of looking at it, and it's it's beautiful and it's good, and we're for all that.
SPEAKER_01: So if you're for a kingdom revolution, let's have everybody stand so nobody feels bad.
SPEAKER_01: Because you might be saying, Steve, this guy, what kind of a church did I come to today on this snowy day?
SPEAKER_01: So nobody's embarrassed, but if you would like to say that you're a part, or at least even a tiny bit, want to be a part of the journey of this kingdom revolution, I want you to look up here.
SPEAKER_01: And I've changed our little wording that we say.
SPEAKER_01: Can you see it really good there?
SPEAKER_01: Okay, great.
SPEAKER_01: If you so read it, just read it yourself.
SPEAKER_01: So I made some changes at the beginning to what we normally say.
SPEAKER_01: So if you can agree with that, I want you just to take your Bible and I want you to hold it up.
SPEAKER_01: And why don't you just repeat after me?
SPEAKER_01: I want to be a part of a kingdom of God revolution.
SPEAKER_01: God can use me to change the world.
SPEAKER_01: I believe God can move mountains in my life and those around me.
SPEAKER_01: I will build up my faith with God's holy word.
SPEAKER_01: I will come alive in the power of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: With Jesus, nothing will be impossible.
SPEAKER_01: So, Father, you hear our prayer, you hear our declaration, we love you and we bless you.
SPEAKER_01: We praise you for who you are.
SPEAKER_01: We praise you, Lord, that you want to raise up a generation of men and women who are mightily used of you.
SPEAKER_01: Father, bring a revival and a revolution.
SPEAKER_01: Bring it here at the road.
SPEAKER_01: God, we ask for that.
SPEAKER_01: We cry out for that.
SPEAKER_01: And God, would you anoint this message this morning?
SPEAKER_01: In your name we pray.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Alright, you can be seated.
SPEAKER_01: Thanks, you guys.
SPEAKER_01: Well, I'm just gonna start today.
SPEAKER_01: We're probably gonna go into it next week a little bit, but turn to Isaiah 61.
SPEAKER_01: And this is, in my opinion, the mission statement of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: This is what he quotes in Luke 4, 18 and 19, when he gives his first sermon, his first message, he gets up and he quotes from Isaiah 61.
SPEAKER_01: But I want to read the whole thing in relation to a kingdom of God revolution because I believe there's a correlation through the whole passage.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm gonna read, make a few comments, and then I want to look at this aspect of what I'm gonna call a watchman on the wall.
SPEAKER_01: Watchman on the wall prayer.
SPEAKER_01: The Spirit of the Lord, God, is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor.
SPEAKER_01: He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound.
SPEAKER_01: Now, let me just stop right there.
SPEAKER_01: Can you imagine anybody in society that doesn't want that?
SPEAKER_01: If we would just start to do that, that in and of itself would be so revolutionary that the church would actually start doing this instead of fighting within itself about every little doctrinal issue that's different than what they believe.
SPEAKER_01: Do you realize there's guys on the internet?
SPEAKER_01: I listen to them because I look at them and I go, man, don't you have anything better to do?
SPEAKER_01: And all they do is critique other pastors and critique other ministers.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, in the name of purity for the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Now, I have no problem with heresy and with those that are in cults and stuff.
SPEAKER_01: I think we need to know the differences, but I'm talking about they pick and tear apart even the body of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And if we could just take some of that energy, heaven help us.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, take some of this energy and actually start preaching good tidings to the poor, healing the brokenhearted, proclaiming liberty to the captives, setting free those who are in prison.
SPEAKER_01: Hello?
SPEAKER_01: You don't think the Holy Spirit would be behind that?
SPEAKER_01: That's what I signed up for.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 2.
SPEAKER_01: To proclaim acceptable year of the Lord, that's a positive message of the kingdom of God and the day of vengeance of our God, of comfort to all who mourn.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 3, to console those who mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garments of praise, for a spirit of heaviness, that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord that he may be glorified.
SPEAKER_01: And they shall rebuild.
SPEAKER_01: They shall rebuild the old ruins.
SPEAKER_01: They shall raise up the former desolations, and they shall repair the ruined cities.
SPEAKER_01: Men and women, God's heart is for our cities.
SPEAKER_01: God's heart is for individuals, those who mourn, those who are brokenhearted, those who've been betrayed, those who've been ripped off.
SPEAKER_01: And everybody in this room, you've experienced a little of that, have you not?
SPEAKER_01: Man, woman, or child, you've experienced betrayal.
SPEAKER_01: You've experienced getting ripped off by others.
SPEAKER_01: You've been hurt by the church.
SPEAKER_01: You've been hurt at your job.
SPEAKER_01: You've been hurt at school.
SPEAKER_01: You've been bullied.
SPEAKER_01: There's been all these things that have happened in our life that we care.
SPEAKER_01: Within us, and only Jesus says, I came to set you free.
SPEAKER_01: I came to heal that broken heart that you have.
SPEAKER_01: And that's why he said, as he began to proclaim there in those cities there in the northern part of Israel, he said, The kingdom of heaven is at hand.
SPEAKER_01: The kingdom of God is at hand.
SPEAKER_01: I want to start with this.
SPEAKER_01: The kingdom of God is at hand.
SPEAKER_01: Repent.
SPEAKER_01: Turn from your ways to my ways, and I'll set you free.
SPEAKER_01: And I will set you free.
SPEAKER_01: The only answer, among many answers that are out there, the only answer that covers a multitude of the issues of our heart is Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: It's the capital A answer.
SPEAKER_01: It's not the only answer to everything in our life, but it is the answer and the rubric by which all other answers fall into place.
SPEAKER_01: So as you go into your profession, as you go into your work, as you go into marriage, if you get the big A, if you get the big answer, Jesus Christ and his kingdom reformation and his kingdom revolution in your heart and in the heart of your marriage and in your life, when you get in your car each day and you begin to see yourself as a revolutionary driving to work, you're going to see transformation.
SPEAKER_01: God's going to start to put people in your life.
SPEAKER_01: He's going to start putting bosses and different situations in your life that the presence of God is needed.
SPEAKER_01: And you're going to bring that presence in there and it's going to make a difference.
SPEAKER_01: So Jesus starts off with his mission statement.
SPEAKER_01: I would say, and I would call it kind of the constitution.
SPEAKER_01: I would say the constitution of the kingdom of God is probably Matthew 5, 6, and 7, which we're going to come to.
SPEAKER_01: But I would say the mandate of the kingdom is right here.
SPEAKER_01: Now go to chapter 62.
SPEAKER_01: Because in chapter 62, and we could go through all of the verses in 61, but it leads up to 62.
SPEAKER_01: Remember, there were no chapter headings and chapter titles when this was written.
SPEAKER_01: This was a, this would have been a stream of thought coming from Isaiah from the Holy Spirit as he wrote.
SPEAKER_01: Until her righteousness goes forth as brightness, and her salvation as a lamp that burns.
SPEAKER_01: The Gentiles shall see your righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: We're the Gentiles, we're the ones who've seen the righteousness of God, and all kings your glory.
SPEAKER_01: You shall be called by a new name, which the mouth of the Lord will name.
SPEAKER_01: You shall also be a crown of glory in the hand of the Lord and a royal diadem in the hand of your God.
SPEAKER_01: You shall no longer be turned forsaken.
SPEAKER_01: How many of you at times it felt like your life is forsaken?
SPEAKER_01: No longer are you forsaken.
SPEAKER_01: Don't keep saying that to yourself.
SPEAKER_01: It's wrong, it's not biblical, and it's not the way Christ views you.
SPEAKER_01: It's not the way we view you here.
SPEAKER_01: No longer will you be termed forsaken.
SPEAKER_01: Nor shall your land anymore be termed desolate.
SPEAKER_01: How many have gone through things in your job or in your finances or your marriage or something you've gone through that feels desolate?
SPEAKER_01: You're not desolate.
SPEAKER_01: God wants to bring revolution into that hopeless, difficult situation by giving you new hope and new purpose.
SPEAKER_01: You shall no longer be termed forsaken, nor shall your land anymore be termed desolate, but you shall be called Hefzah and your land Beulah.
SPEAKER_01: And here's what those terms mean.
SPEAKER_01: For the Lord delights in you.
SPEAKER_01: Hezpah delights in you.
SPEAKER_01: Your land shall be married, Beulah.
SPEAKER_01: For as a young man marries a virgin, so shall your son marry you, your sons marry you.
SPEAKER_01: And as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.
SPEAKER_01: Men and women, God rejoices over you.
SPEAKER_01: He loves you, he calls you his beloved, he calls you his delight, he calls you priest and kings.
SPEAKER_01: You're priesting kings over your territory.
SPEAKER_01: Because of the Holy Spirit that lives within you, as you put Jesus Christ on the throne of your heart.
SPEAKER_01: And then he explains how this begins to happen, and this is my key point today, verse 6.
SPEAKER_01: I have set watchmen on your walls, O Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: They shall never hold their peace day or night.
SPEAKER_01: That's 24 hours, day or night.
SPEAKER_01: You who make mention of the Lord do not keep silent and give him no rest.
SPEAKER_01: Give God no rest until he establishes, until he makes Jerusalem a place on the earth.
SPEAKER_01: Now for me, I have Jerusalem marked out, and I put in Colorado Springs.
SPEAKER_01: God wants Colorado Springs to be a model city to the nations of the world.
SPEAKER_01: He does.
SPEAKER_01: I believe that he wants cities of our world to be model cities of a kingdom revolution because that's where he went.
SPEAKER_01: As Jesus modeled a kingdom revolution to us, and we're going to go through that in the next weeks as we go through Matthew, you're going to see that he brings transformation wherever he goes.
SPEAKER_01: And I believe God's called us to that same mission on the face of the globe.
SPEAKER_01: And I think the preaching of the gospel is foremost, but secondarily, men and women, is that in your jobs, in your families, that we might have a kingdom of revolution there.
SPEAKER_01: That's how we do it.
SPEAKER_01: Very few of us are called to missions in the sense of a full-time vocational work that we do as a missionary, but you're all missionary.
SPEAKER_01: We're all missionary.
SPEAKER_01: We're all called to do the works of Christ and even greater works.
SPEAKER_01: Because he goes to the Father and He intercedes for us that he might use us mightily and powerfully.
SPEAKER_01: So the term that I'm using is a kingdom revolution watchman.
SPEAKER_01: To be a kingdom revolution watchman.
SPEAKER_01: I have set watchmen on your walls, O Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: They have never held their peace.
SPEAKER_01: They do not hold their peace day or night.
SPEAKER_01: You who make mention of the Lord do not keep silent and give him no rest till he establishes until he makes Jerusalem a praise in the earth.
SPEAKER_01: Interesting, Isaiah, using the image of watchmen on the walls of the city as intercessors, as those who pray, who those who call out to God day and night, until the mission and the purpose of God is accomplished in Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: We know the story of Nehemiah.
SPEAKER_01: If you don't know the story of Nehemiah, it'd be a really fun book for you to read this year.
SPEAKER_01: It's the book of Nehemiah.
SPEAKER_01: But if you know the story, Nehemiah was a cupbearer of the king.
SPEAKER_01: God gave him a vision to go back to Israel.
SPEAKER_01: He's really a slave.
SPEAKER_01: Go back to Israel and begin to be used as a leader to rebuild the crumbling walls around Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: And as he did that, as he built those walls, he came up with a genius plan.
SPEAKER_01: The genius plan was trying to get this group, and by the way, I think it was Goldamair who once said, the problem with being a prime minister in Israel is that everybody thinks they're a prime minister.
SPEAKER_01: And so the same thing happened with Nehemiah.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, getting the princes and the regular people and the business community to come together to rebuild the walls, he came up with a plan.
SPEAKER_01: Build the walls right next to your house.
SPEAKER_01: Because the house, houses, the back of the houses all backed up to the wall all around Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: And so people can they could get that, that if they just started working on the back side of their house and rebuilding the walls there, they would be protected.
SPEAKER_01: And so building a wall is not that different here in prayer, is I want us to begin to build walls as watchmen over our families and over our lives and over our jobs.
SPEAKER_01: And I'll explain that in a minute what I mean by that.
SPEAKER_01: But the imagery is clear from Isaiah of watchmen of the Lord coming in in worship and in prayer for a mighty work of God over a city.
SPEAKER_01: So I want to give six characteristics.
SPEAKER_01: Let me give you six characteristics of a kingdom revolutionary watchman.
SPEAKER_01: And what you see on the paper here on both sides is I'm going to challenge you to take one hour a week.
SPEAKER_01: One hour a week to pray for a kingdom revolution in the Rockies.
SPEAKER_01: One hour a week.
SPEAKER_01: 168 hours in a week.
SPEAKER_01: One hour.
SPEAKER_01: We already have 89 people signed up for 168 hours.
SPEAKER_01: So you're going to go up there and you're going to see all these names because I've already introduced this to many parts of our church in different meetings, and everybody just jumps in.
SPEAKER_01: So let me give you some qualities.
SPEAKER_01: We'll get as far as we've got in four minutes, and then we're going to take part two next week.
SPEAKER_01: First quality: a watchman worships.
SPEAKER_01: A watchman worships.
SPEAKER_01: The very best place to start as a kingdom revolutionary is learning to be a worshiper.
SPEAKER_01: Begin with the end in mind, the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: When we go into this one hour, I want to encourage you to always start with worship.
SPEAKER_01: Take one hour a week that's not committed to anything but revolutionary thinking, revolutionary prayer, revolutionary vision.
SPEAKER_01: Take your mind off yourself, take your mind off your family, one hour out of 168 hours to come in, and the best place to start is to worship the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: To begin to worship the Lord in his presence so that the presence gets on you.
SPEAKER_01: How many of you know that when the presence gets on you, healing has a chance to really be energized within you?
SPEAKER_01: Faith is actually elevated because it's not you.
SPEAKER_01: How many of you are sick of you?
SPEAKER_01: Anybody kind of sick of you?
SPEAKER_01: Okay, good.
SPEAKER_01: Because I get kind of sick of me, and I always move toward selfishness, and I always move toward envy, and I always move toward jealousy.
SPEAKER_01: All those things are resident within me from time to time.
SPEAKER_01: But when I get into the presence and I truly, sincerely try to seek the Lord, God's presence takes over my presence, and there's a joy, and there's a peace, and there's potential for healing in my heart.
SPEAKER_01: So starting with worship as a watchman to learn to worship the Lord before you pray, before you say about, you know, your spouse or your boyfriend and your girlfriend.
SPEAKER_01: You see, David was a watchman in worship before he was a warrior on the battlefield.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say that again.
SPEAKER_01: That's that preaches pretty good.
SPEAKER_01: David was a watchman in worship before he was a warrior on the battlefield.
SPEAKER_01: The problem with the political arena is we got too many warriors and not enough worshipers and warriors.
SPEAKER_01: Because I'm for warring, I'm for the debate.
SPEAKER_01: I love the debate.
SPEAKER_01: The debate's exactly the right thing to do.
SPEAKER_01: Nobody debates better than Jews.
SPEAKER_01: So they invented the word.
SPEAKER_01: You know, so I believe it's biblical to debate.
SPEAKER_01: You see it all through scripture.
SPEAKER_01: The question, though, is out of what kind of a spirit, out of what kind of a heart?
SPEAKER_01: So to begin with worship in our heart.
SPEAKER_01: Isaiah 52, 8, your watchmen shall lift up their voices.
SPEAKER_01: With their voices they shall sing together.
SPEAKER_01: These are the watchman on the wall.
SPEAKER_01: 2 Chronicles 20.
SPEAKER_01: And when he had consulted with the people, he appointed those who should sing to the Lord and who should praise the beauty of holiness as they went out before the army and were saying, Praise the Lord, for his mercy endures forever.
SPEAKER_01: Now when they began to sing and to praise, the Lord set ambushes against the people of Amon, Moab, and Mount Seir, who had come against Judah, and they were defeated.
SPEAKER_01: Remember Acts 16?
SPEAKER_01: Paul and Silas in prison.
SPEAKER_01: But at midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.
SPEAKER_01: Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken, and immediately all the doors were open, and everyone's chains were loosed.
SPEAKER_01: You see, when we worship, we begin to fight a battle through worship on two fronts.
SPEAKER_01: And we get enamored way too much in the three-dimensional world, and we forget that there's a fourth-dimensional world empowering, affecting, and influencing the three-dimensional world.
SPEAKER_01: So we look at issues with our kids and some of the stuff they're going through.
SPEAKER_01: Or we look at stuff in our works and the jobs that we have, and we get so focused on that, sometimes we forget, not in every case, but in many cases, what's influencing our three-dimensional world is a fourth-dimensional work of demonic powers or angelic powers.
SPEAKER_01: And so when we begin to worship, when we begin to pray, as we become watchmen, you're affecting the three-dimensional world by impacting the fourth-dimensional world.
SPEAKER_01: Scripture after scripture after scripture seems to indicate, and we don't all completely understand this yet, that when we worship the Lord, something is released in the fourth dimension that comes down and affects the three-dimensional world.
SPEAKER_01: Prayer and worship are the greatest tools that God's given us to impact the fourth-dimensional world.
SPEAKER_01: And so to begin with worship.
SPEAKER_01: Secondly, and I'll end with this, we've got one minute here, second quality, is a watchman watches.
SPEAKER_01: A watchman watches.
SPEAKER_01: The priest over Israel, as a part of their priestly function, was to watch.
SPEAKER_01: 2 Chronicles 23, 6.
SPEAKER_01: And all of us are priests, priests of God.
SPEAKER_01: So when we come into prayer to become watchmen during this one hour, and I'm going to explain more next week about that, we start with worship, but then we watch.
SPEAKER_01: What's God doing?
SPEAKER_01: To ask the Lord, you know, with your journal, to write down, God, what are you saying to me to watch through discernment that he gives you about things that are happening all around you?
SPEAKER_01: Jeremiah 33, 3.
SPEAKER_01: Call to me, and I will answer you and show you great and mighty things which you do not know.
SPEAKER_01: Which you do not know.
SPEAKER_01: I remember one time a guy came up to me and he said, I don't understand this prayer thing.
SPEAKER_01: He says, I don't know why this, I don't really get and understand the prayer thing because I don't know exactly what to pray.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Well, just start crying out to God that you don't know what to pray, and he will show you things that you're supposed to pray about.
SPEAKER_01: Because as we call out to him, he'll download into our hearts and into our spirits what he's called us to do.
SPEAKER_01: Men and women, listen.
SPEAKER_01: If we don't become a people that are watchmen in prayer, we will not see a revolution in the Rockies.
SPEAKER_01: We will not see a revolution in our city.
SPEAKER_01: You will not see a revolution in your own marriage, your own life, your own singleness.
SPEAKER_01: Wherever God's got you, it begins in prayer.
SPEAKER_01: So here's what I want to challenge us to.
SPEAKER_01: Look at the card that you received.
SPEAKER_01: On the side that says Kingdom Revolution Watchman has Isaiah 61 and 62 at the top.
SPEAKER_01: This is our passion for how to pray.
SPEAKER_01: Because I think if there's one thing that we struggle with in prayer, it's how do we pray?
SPEAKER_01: And so I've given you a picture of how to pray.
SPEAKER_01: And then if you flip it over to the other side, Wesley Tullis, a member of our church, has designed a much more integrated, much more specific way to pray on the other side.
SPEAKER_01: And we can explain this more next week.
SPEAKER_01: But just go back to the first one that I showed you.
SPEAKER_01: This is how I like to pray.
SPEAKER_01: I get excited about this, and that is to pray for yourself, your own heart, your own vision first.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, bring a kingdom revolution in my life.
SPEAKER_01: God, would you would you uh resurrect within me that first love that's been lost over time?
SPEAKER_01: God, would you would you uh renew that?
SPEAKER_01: Would you resurrect that?
SPEAKER_01: God, I want intimacy with you.
SPEAKER_01: And I cry out for that.
SPEAKER_01: Do you think God gets really frustrated when he hears people say that?
SPEAKER_01: Oh no.
SPEAKER_01: He wants, she wants more of me.
SPEAKER_01: Of course he's excited about that.
SPEAKER_01: And we know from from 1 John 4, 18 and 19, if we pray according to his will, he hears us, and we know that he hears us, we know that we receive what we've asked of him.
SPEAKER_01: And so that's to pray for kingdom revolution, then your family.
SPEAKER_01: Pray for revolution in your family.
SPEAKER_01: Pray for revolution in your career, your job, your school, your church, your city, region, and the U.S.
SPEAKER_01: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_01: So, starting here at the beginning, if we start with worship and we start praying through this, God's gonna give you passages, God's gonna speak to you, and your hour will be boom, it'll be done.
SPEAKER_01: It'll happen so fast.
SPEAKER_01: But just start there.
SPEAKER_00: You've been listening to The Road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.
SPEAKER_00: We hope you have been blessed by today's message.
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SPEAKER_00: If you're walking through a difficult time, we want to pray for you.
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SPEAKER_00: Thanks again for tuning in today, and be sure to listen to the next edition of The Road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.