Spirit Stream #67 - Holding on to Jesus | Psalm 34

In Spirit Stream #67, Nick Griemsmann teaches on holding on to Jesus and finding deliverance through Psalm 34. Learn how to overcome fear, self-righteousness, and afflictions by trusting in God’s faithfulness and surrendering to the Holy Spirit.

Timestamps:
•  0:00 - Welcome & Holy Ghost Atmosphere
•  4:00 - Personal Testimony & God’s Faithfulness
•  12:00 - The Simplicity of the Gospel
•  22:00 - Escaping Self-Righteousness & Religious Confusion
•  35:00 - Reading & Teaching on Psalm 34
•  55:00 - Deliverance from Fear & Afflictions
•  1:10:00 - Practical Faith & Real Life Stories
•  1:17:00 - Closing Prayer & Ministry Info

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 1:16

Hello, everybody. Nick Grossman here. This is Holy Ghost Television. Spirit Stream number sixty-seven. I'm coming at you live from Phoenix, Arizona. And uh we're gonna have a good little broadcast here today. I'm just gonna um uh wait on the Lord and see what he has for us. I really love Jesus. Uh he saved me uh from so much, delivered me from so many things, healed me of so many things. I remember years ago I wrote down all the answered prayers I had, and this was about 12, 13 years ago, and I I went over 100 answered prayers. And so when you start getting answered prayers, you can you can start seeing God's faithfulness to you, and then pretty soon you can pray and just trust that God's gonna either give it to you because it's his will, or maybe it's not his will, or maybe you have to wait, or however it is, but God is faithful and he hears the prayers of his people. Amen. And you're uh one of his people, you're a child of God through faith in Jesus Christ the Messiah, amen. So Jesus came and fulfilled the law and the prophets, and he fulfilled the law of Moses, the prophets, like I just said, and then he died on the cross for our sins and rose from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit, and he sits at the right hand of the Father forever, interceding for us. And it's all by grace through faith we're saved, not by works. What does that mean? It's all by God's work that we're saved, it's by his faith, his grace, his everything that we're saved. It has nothing to do with us. We were chosen uh somehow, however, this works, through uh God uh in eternities past or before time began to be holy and blameless in him in love. And so somehow you're chosen by God. Isn't that amazing? And so uh praise God. We're uh somehow, I don't know how that works. It's like uh either we have um like he already knows how it's gonna unfold. So we have free will and he already knows what everybody's gonna choose, and so he can call us predestined before time began, or he chose us before. I don't really know. Um, I am here. Hey, Jameson on YouTube, thanks for joining. I am here just to proclaim that Jesus is the Messiah. Amen. And by faith in him, you can become a child of God, you can have all your sins forgiven. You can be born again in your spirit. You can be born again and you can uh inherit the kingdom of God. Amen. So, Lord, we just thank you for tonight. Thank you for the power of the Holy Spirit. Thank you for this broadcast. Thank you for Holy Ghost Television, Spirit Stream number 67. Lord, I don't know where you're taking Holy Ghost television, but I pray it goes forth to help many people. I pray it goes forth to help many people, Lord Jesus. I thank you that you hear the prayers of the righteous and we are righteous. I am righteous as well, through you, Jesus, not by our own self. We are righteous by faith in Jesus of Nazareth. And Lord, I pray that your peace and your love and your joy come to this uh little live stream here and that you help someone out there. Amen. I'm just gonna wait a second. Thank you, Holy Spirit. Hallelujah. Thank you, Holy Spirit, thank you. Thank you, Holy Spirit. Speak to your people today through me, Lord. Thank you, hallelujah. Thank you, Lord. So amazing, you know. Before I got saved, I was uh, you know, before I became a Christian, I always believed in God, you know. Maybe you're one of those people, or you know somebody like that, that you know, you believe in God, right? But you're still searching for truth, or you're searching for um the way, right? You're searching what's right. And so maybe you're somebody like me who went to world religions courses in college, or you uh did uh, you know, a lot of different spiritual things. You know, I went to psychics, I went to um uh uh, you know, when they program your mind, what's that called? Mental um, I can't remember the name of it, but basically when they hypnotize you. I went to all these different types of spiritual type energy type things. I went to uh different bookstores learned trying to learn. I I went and researched Hinduism, Buddhism, I looked into Islam, Judaism, Christianity, Roman Catholicism. Then you get to Christianity, right? And there's like 10,000 or whatever different denominations. And so somebody who's searching for the truth or or for God, they get really confused, right? It's like, you know how they say it's like the Matrix, right? You ever heard of that? Like uh the movie The Matrix, how we're it's like a program, software program, and people are in it. And it's like you have the red pill or the blue pill. You're trying to figure out, you know, uh, is this the reality? You know, do I go back to regular reality or do I take the other pill and and my mind is open to a new reality? And but it's like the devil in the world system wants to keep us away from uh the truth, right? Wants to keep us away from uh what's gonna save us, what's gonna prosper us, what's gonna write our names in the Lamb's Book of Life, what's gonna actually help us, right? And give us that relationship with God and the forgiveness of sins. And so there's all these different avenues that seem right, you know. You you could have all these different avenues that seem right, you know, pray to this God, do this uh religious thing, uh, you know, wear these beads, or um believe in energy crystals, or whatever. There's all sorts of different idols, different types of ways people try to find God and find truth. And, you know, you talk with people and they're they always they're not always, but a lot of times people are like, well, always lead to God, right? Always lead to God of uh, you know, the the the creator, right? But there that's not true. Okay, that's not true. Uh it's like the matrix wants to keep people from the truth, and the truth is so simple and easy that it seems uh untrue because it's so simple and easy. Uh, for example, Jesus said, All those who believe in me should not perish but have everlasting life. So it takes belief in Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah, to be saved and to have everlasting life. It seems too uh complicated or uh too easy for people, and we complicate things. So the devil wants us to complicate everything. So your healing, your deliverance, your uh salvation, everything. He wants to complicate everything so that it's difficult to find the way. But Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no one can come to the Father except through me. So if you are somebody that is uh under that belief that everywhere, you know, every path leads to God and blah, blah, blah, Jesus specifically said that he is the only way to the Father. You have to go through Jesus Christ's blood to reach the Father. You have to go through the veil, through his flesh, right? Broken for us, ripped apart for us, his flesh to reach God the Father, to reach the holy of holies. Because God is so holy and so perfect that you, as a mortal person with sinful flesh, you are not holy enough to approach God in yourself. And so Jesus had to come and do it for us because we were too weak because of the human nature we were born in. So you're too weak to become righteous on yourself by yourself. Okay, so you're too weak to become righteous in your own self. It has to be Jesus of Nazareth that makes you righteous by grace through faith. And that seems so easy, but people want things that are complicated, they want a bunch of rules they have to follow, or uh all this uh uh, you know, fables and fairy tales and all this stuff they make up to make somebody righteous. They're trying to, a lot of people are trying to believe they're righteous because they didn't do a specific sin. Like you're not in prison because you robbed a bank. So you think you're righteous. And you look at people who are in prison as bad people and you see yourself as a good person because you didn't do uh a bad thing like them. But Jesus cut to the heart, the word of God cuts to the heart, and it shows you that you're a bad person in yourself. You are a bad person in yourself. Without God living inside of you, you are condemned a sinner because the Bible says we have all fallen short of the glory of God. We all have fallen short of the glory of God, we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. So sin is basically the breaking of God's law, right? And we have all broke one point of God's law at least one time in our lives, right? Just in our own flesh. Just even looking at a woman to lust after her, you've already committed adultery with her already in your heart. That's what Jesus said. If you're angry with your brother without a cause, you're a murder, you're just like a murderer. Okay. So Jesus broke the law down to go into the insides of the individual. So people who are self-righteous, they look at the outward. They say, Well, I wash my hands this way, I pray this way, I pray eight times a day. I fast during these times of uh the month. Um, I haven't stolen something. Uh maybe I did when I was a kid, but I, you know, that doesn't really count or whatever. Um, I don't lie, I haven't committed adultery in my wife, all these things, but inwardly, inwardly, there's sin in there. So the fallen nature has sin inside of it. Okay. So you have sin inside of you. And then Christ comes to change the inside of you and to transform you to be more like him. And it's so simple and easy. The gospel is so simple and easy that people they can't believe how easy and simple it is. Because why? Self-righteousness. So the devil, he throws self-righteousness on everybody. Hey, everybody, how's it going? Good to see you guys. Joyce, Amber, Martin, all Facebook, YouTube. Thank you for joining, guys. Okay, so so think about it. So the devil throws self-righteousness at everybody. You know, they wear all these clothes to make them righteous, they perform all these things to make them righteous, they they uh celebrate days and in different things to make them righteous. Their uh their righteousness comes from themselves. Okay, and what happens is that that makes you a judgmental person, and it makes you think you're better than others. It exalts, you exalt yourself over somebody else. And that's what the Pharisees did during Jesus' time. They bring people to Jesus, they brought the adulterer to Jesus, and they were gonna stone her. And Jesus said, What? He who is without sin cast the first stone, and no one there could cast a stone at the lady, the woman caught in adultery. They were all convicted by that. Okay. So Jesus offers us forgiveness and he for and he offers us a relationship with God and he offers us eternal life. And it's as simply as believing that Jesus Christ is the only way, that he is the Lord, that he is the Messiah, that through him I can get to the Father, that he is everything, he is the Messiah, the Lord, and that through him I can be forgiven for my sins. Through him I can have eternal life. So let's say you've believed that, right? So you're watching this, you're a Christian, you believe that, I believed it, and I believe it, right? We believe it. But what does the devil want to do? Remember, the devil wants to keep you in self-righteousness. He wants to keep you in that bondage of self-righteousness. So if he can't stop you from being saved, right? So he can't stop you from being saved because um, you know, it's a work of God. So what is he gonna do? He's gonna do is because it's a war of faith. So what is he trying to do? It's a battle of faith. So he's gonna try to get you to remain self-righteous. He's gonna get you to always look at yourself. Always look at yourself because when you're looking at yourself, it's not of faith. The law is not of faith. Okay, so trying to be a good person is not of faith. You have to receive being a good person or having the Holy Spirit in you, loving your neighbor by faith. You can't just force yourself to love your neighbor. You have to partner with the Holy Spirit to love your neighbor as yourself. Everything depends on the Holy Spirit in you and trusting him and letting go of yourself. You know, like a lot of times we try to do uh things in our flesh and we get to a certain point and we hit a wall, right? So let's say you try to do something in yourself and and you're you're it's all your strength. You're trying to uh uh let's say uh quit drinking alcohol. So you stop drinking alcohol and you're doing so good, and then you fall off the wagon six months later, a year later, two years later, three years later, then you beat yourself up and you try again and you're trying in yourself. Okay. I'm trying to I'm trying to help you with this because it's helped me so much to just literally realize that I am helpless in myself. I'm completely helpless in myself. I need Jesus Christ. See, self-righteous people, they will reject the gospel, they will reject uh Christianity, sometimes they'll reject Jesus because they don't see a need, because they don't see that they are um that they are uh sinners, that they are no good in themselves. A lot of people are like that. Well, you know, I'm just a good person. You know, you talk to people, I'm I'm a good person. Um no, you're not. You're not a good person. You might do things that are good and you might feel like you're a good person here and there, but compared to God's holiness, you're not a good person in yourself. The only goodness that you have is God in you, is that the parts that God has put in you, right? Not to say there's good things about, I understand there's good in people. But overall, we're all convicted of sinner. So that's like the first thing you need to understand is that before Christ, you were hopeless. Now you have Christ, and the devil wants to get you back on yourself. Well, you know, you have to pray really hard and fast for 40 days to get deliverance. No, you don't. You have to surrender to the cross, to Jesus Christ, and realize that He's He's your deliverer, He's your healer. There, you can't do anything apart from Jesus. And when you learn this, Christianity becomes really simple, like a lot more simpler and easier. Because, you know, I have been so confused through the years with all the things that I learned that sound really good, but they're self-focused. A lot of them are self-focused. How do you get blessed? Okay. How do you get blessed? I'm gonna teach you, I'm gonna sell you this book, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna you are already blessed in Christ. And all you have to do to receive blessings from God is to believe in Jesus Christ and allow the Holy Spirit to take you through the process of transformation to prepare you for what God has for you. But what happens is you get stunt in your in your growth because you think it has something to do with you. You think it has something to do with you, but Christ came and purchased your body, and the Holy Spirit lives in you now and wants to live through you. So our job is to agree with truth and to allow him to transform us through surrendering, resisting the devil, submitting to God, right? All these things. We can do that by partnering with the Lord. So you try really hard to get breakthrough, you try really hard to be blessed financially, you're trying everything, and you hit the wall, or it starts manifesting a different area of your life. You know, you start stop drinking, but then you start smoking cigarettes a lot, or you start having uh issue with pornography or whatever. So it switches roles. So that type of stronghold just kind of switches. Does that make sense? Type uh that makes sense if you hear me. Okay, so like it switches, and maybe you're somebody like that. You you're you're hardcore in one area of your life, but another area of your life it manifests. You know, a lot of people can receive healing and they can't receive finances, or they can receive finances, but they have a hard time receiving healing. Why is that? Well, I have a theory about that. I don't think I'm gonna go into it right now, Lord. Should I go into it? I don't know. Anyway, uh, thank you. Makes sense. Thank you, Martine. Okay, so I'm gonna slow down for a second. Thank you, Lord. Okay, thank you, Lord. Where was I at? Just trying to hang out with you guys, have some fun. Hallelujah. Thank you, Lord, for Spirit Stream 67. Okay, so we try really, really hard. You try to get a breakthrough, you try all these things and you hit the wall. And I meet them all the time. I don't understand why I'm broke. I don't understand why this is happening. I don't understand. I don't because you think you're still alive. You think your life still belongs to you. You don't really believe or understand yet that you were crucified with Christ. You were crucified with him. It's no longer you that live, it's Christ that lives in your body. So allow him to live your his life through you. You know, one time years ago, I remember telling this uh lady I was ministering to at a meeting, I told her, you know, you're gonna be different as you grow in grace, as you grow with the Lord. You're gonna look back and be like, wow, my personality's changed so much. And because she came from uh the world system, she she like got mad at me and said, My personality is uh, my personality, I'm fine. This is who God made me. What he wants me to be, a different person, a different personality, a different character. And to her, it she felt like I was telling her that she wasn't gonna be herself anymore, like you know, she's gonna be gone or something. I don't know. But years now, I know her, years later, her personality is totally different. Okay. When I used to know her, her character, her personality was so different, like the world system. And she would pray and she beg God for a husband, and she used to uh um call for prayer and she'd come to meetings, and and I care about this person and tried to help them best I could, encourage them. And guess what? This person now is in ministry, full-time, married, having a great life, and their personality is different, just like I said 15 years ago, or whatever I said to them, to the person. They're different now. And guess what? Now they have the promises that they were crying to God about 15 or 10 or whatever years ago. I want to be married, I want a ministry, all that stuff. And their character wasn't there yet, their personality wasn't there yet. You could get saved, and your personality could be really messed up still. You could you could be saved. You could go to prison, get saved, get out of prison, and still have the same personality, similar personality to when you were uh when you were uh in in prison or before you, you know, you could be a drug, uh a drug addict or a drug dealer and get saved, supernaturally saved, your heart changes, but you still got this personality, this character that needs changing through the Holy Ghost in you. But what happens is that the matrix, the, you know, I call it the matrix, but you know, like the devil and the world system doesn't want you to transform. So it's gonna do everything it can to get you away from this transformation process. Send you bad relationships, uh, you know, give you weird ideas to do weird things, to uh get you to go to religious uh mini cults, I call them, these churches that are like mini-cults where everybody controls each other, right? Give you a bunch of false doctrine, give you a bunch of works-based stuff, trying to get you to change yourself, get you to go to therapy for 20 years and never learn anything, never change, and try to uh tell you that you're broken. You know, you hear that all the time. We're just broken. No, we're not. You're not a broken person. You got the Holy Ghost power in you. God is transforming you from that broken person that died with Christ to a new person risen with Christ, walking in the power of the Holy Ghost. So you're not a broken person anymore. But the world system is gonna tell you that you're a broken person, works-based uh types, uh, mentality, these things, uh, work for things get. You're gonna be blessed if you do, do, do, do, do. No, you're blessed because Jesus did, did, did, did, did, and then you allow him to do, do, do through you. See? But we get taught to do, do, do, do, do, and then God owes us stuff. I prayed for 12 hours today. You owe me. Who gave you the grace to pray? Right? So God gives you the grace to do things, he doesn't owe you anything. God doesn't owe us anything, right? He doesn't owe you money because you gave 10% of your money to your church. He doesn't owe you anything. That's it. If you are somebody that gives to the Lord and you're telling him he owes you, you have a wrong mindset. Martine says, uh, this is a past comment, but says, that was me for 40 years. Yeah, running around the mountain, uh, learning, yeah, in the mind, uh, being self-righteous. Yeah, absolutely. Thank you for commenting, guys. Yeah, so think about it. So uh you give money, let's say, to a ministry, to a church, and then you tell God you owe, owe me money back. Because somewhere you learn that. You learn that God owes you money. You learned it from the world system or from a works-based mentality. Okay. Be humble. You don't God doesn't owe you anything. In fact, you should be in the lake of fire with me. We in yourself, you deserve the lake of fire. Okay, so you giving God money, telling him he owes you stuff, is the wrong mindset. Okay, it's the wrong mindset. Lord, I fasted for two weeks. I'm not healed yet. You owe me a healing because I fasted. Think of that mindset there, guys. God doesn't owe you anything. He gives everything to you freely, it's already there. And by grace through faith, you can start learning everything's there for us. Sometimes it takes a while. Sometimes we have to learn something. Sometimes we have to go through situations. You know, I don't tell you everything I go through, right? I go through a ton of stuff. I don't share everything I go through. But I have been through seasons where I have to go to the doctor all the time. You know? I'm like, why do I keep going to this scan, this blood work, this, this, this. And then I could go into fear and torment and thinking, oh Lord, you're you owe me a healing. Why aren't I healed yet? Blah, blah, blah. But you know what? God got me through it all. He got me through those seasons. Just like King David said. King David, what did he say? Let's look it up. Since I got this open. Um, let me type it up real quick. Um, that's probably not the one. That's not the one. I can't, it's not coming up right now. Um, well, I mean, Psalm 34. That's good. Let's go to Bible Hub. I got Bible Hub over here. Let's see if I can do that. How do I do that? Oh, I do this. Sorry, guys. Okay, so I got Genesis 1. So let's look up uh uh delivered uh delivered oops. Delivered me all my life or something. Um I can't find her right now. I'll search it later. But I'm probably just typing in wrong. So Psalm 34, let's just let's just read Psalm 34 together and encourage each other, okay? Let's let's read this. God's faithful. Okay, so this is I was talking to a uh uh Orthodox Jewish woman the other day. Uh I met through business, I was doing some business in town, and uh I met an Orthodox Jewish woman, and uh I got to minister to her. It was really nice. I got to give her some scriptures and talk with her, and she was mentioning the scripture I was giving her. She said, Oh, well, that was written by Ruth, and it was the book of Psalms. I said, That's written by David. And a lot of times people get information wrong. And so, like I mentioned the other day on, I think it was our uh partners' meeting, how you have to figure out if when you're ministering to somebody, what's the information, where are they getting their information from? You know, like your kids or your family members could be getting information about God or the Bible or Jesus uh falsely or through different avenues uh than the Bible. They could be watching something on YouTube or whatever and getting some different information. So if somebody uh rattles something off to you, let's say your friend, Christian friend, tries to tell you, well, this is what it means, da-da-da-da. You you want to figure out the information, where they're getting their information from, so you can have you can have uh you can bring them to the truth, so you can have some uh knowledge of where they're getting information from because you could just be arguing over uh a similar thing, but there's just different information. And so the the cool thing about the Bible is it is the final authority. In a world where there's no truth, you know, that people are looking for truth, there's no real truth anymore, really. It's all fake news and AI and stuff like that. Get people to the word of God and discuss the Bible. You know, if they are talking about something about Jesus or this, about creation or that, figure out where their information is from, see if it's legit and try to bring them to the word of God and explain to them the truth in love, right? So the Bible says here, taste and see that the Lord is good, okay? Psalm 34. Uh he this is uh from David, uh when he was uh uh acting like he was insane before Ambalek, right? I can't pronounce it, okay? Um, so the king drove him away. Okay. So he was David was uh scared for his life and he was running and he was going through a lot of stuff. So you could be going through a lot of stuff, you could be scared, you could be, you could have your enemies all around you, you could be dealing with sickness, you could be dealing with financial stuff, whatever it is, you know. Uh uh whatever it is, it's tough for you, right? It's a tough situation. I empathize with you, but I haven't gone through everything you've gone through, or you haven't gone through things I've gone through, right? All that stuff. So you can empathize with people, but you can't uh uh know exactly what they're going through, right? Okay, so I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise will always be on my lips. So David here is saying, What? I will bless the Lord at all times, not when I'm just in the flower field. Uh I will bless him at all times, even when somebody's chasing me, or I have to fight an army, or I'm dealing with poverty or sickness. I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise will always be on my lips. So have that attitude that David had that I will bless the Lord at all times. You get fired from work, bless the Lord. I will praise the Lord. Bless the Lord. All things work together for good because you're a son or daughter of God, he's always with you. So you can praise and bless the Lord at all times, okay? My soul boasts in the Lord. So he's saying, I boast in the Lord, my insides, my heart, my mind. It is boasting in the Lord. The Lord is good. Amen. Let the oppressed hear and rejoice. So let the oppressed people hear and rejoice. So if you're oppressed, hear and rejoice. What? That you can bless the Lord. His praise is always there. Your soul can boast in the Lord. Even if you're oppressed and you um and you're down and out, hear the gospel, hear about Jesus Christ, that Jesus delivers and heals by grace through faith, that you can call on the name of the Lord and He will deliver you. Magnify the Lord with me. Let us exalt his name together. I sought the Lord and He answered me. So this is my prayer for you, for anybody watching or listening to this, that you will seek the Lord and He will answer you, just like He did David. So David had faith just like you. David had faith in the coming Messiah. And so it was accounted to him for righteousness, just like uh Abraham and just like you. So he was righteous, he sought the Lord, and he answered him. So you're a righteous person, you can seek the Lord, and the Lord will answer you when you seek him what? With your heart, when you're sincere. You're dealing with this sickness that lasted for years. Hey, I've been through it, and I sought the Lord, and he answered me. He did, he answered me, and he gave me a plan, he healed me, he set me free. Why? Because of Jesus Christ, because of the faith some you know he put in me. Somehow he put it in me, right? Supernaturally. I have faith in Jesus Christ. I have been granted to be able to see the beauty of the gospel, the blood of Jesus, the crown of thorns, the whipping, the beard being pulled out for me, hang him hanging there in shame, naked, bleeding for us, for me, for you. Amen. We were we were blessed with our eyes being open to that. There's people that see the passion of the Christ or different movies and shows, or uh have even read the Bible, been to church, and they they have the blinders on still. So pray for those people that God would lift their blinders. Amen. That their hearts would be touched by the truth that Jesus cares about them and he desires all men to be saved. Magnify the Lord with me. Let us exalt his name together. I sought the Lord and he answered me. He what? Delivered me from all my fears. So if you deal with fear, finances, uh, family issues, you you're fearful about your future, you're fearful about AI, you're fearful about nuclear war, you're fearful, fearful all day long, fear. Call on the Lord. He'll answer you. He will deliver you from all your fears. So write down your biggest fear. You know, what is your biggest fear? What holds you back from moving forward? Fear of failure, fear of rejection, fear of uh missing out, fear of uh going broke, fear of disease, fear of death, fear of flying, fear of this, fear of speaking in public. Write it down and call on the name of the Lord. Seek the Lord and ask him to deliver you from that. Lord, deliver me from fear of speaking in public. Lord, deliver me from fear of failure, fear of success. Lord, deliver me from fear of rejection. You know, you might be called to be an evangelist and do crusades in Africa or India. You're called to win a million souls for Jesus, but you're sitting there regurgitating this fear of speaking in public. Because the world system and the trauma you went through told you somewhere and programmed you with fear that people are judging you all the time. I've dealt with it. I totally understand. Do you know how hard it is to go online and talk when you see yourself and your mind's trying to tell you, oh, well, you're not 25 years old anymore. You don't have all your hair. You're not hip and cool like these other evangelists. You know, I deal with stuff too, guys, but I have to go through it. I have to say nope. I will not listen to fear of rejection. Who cares what people think of me? I'm glorifying Jesus Christ of Nazareth. I'm not hip and cool. I don't have flowing locks like uh, I don't know, uh Tarzan or whoever, right? Tarzan, I don't know, you know, like long hair. I don't have that. It's okay because Jesus Christ lives in my body and he will glorify himself through me. And I all I have to do is submit to him and resist those temptations to listen to the lies of the world and the uh the world system and whatever the internet's telling me at the time or whatever. You have to choose what you're gonna listen to. You have to choose what you're gonna believe. Am I gonna believe that I'm a loser and that I can't talk in public or on live stream because I don't look like a supermodel? Or Fabio, that's what I was trying to. I said Tarzan, those, but Fabio, the guy with long hair and the model, okay? I don't look like him. I don't have long hair like him. People might think I'm ugly. Who cares? Jesus Christ is Lord, right? And so I can't live my life thinking, rehashing. What if somebody rejects me? What if I'm not the coolest guy out there? What if I'm not hip like a 20-year-old preacher? What if I'm not like that? Okay. But God loves me just the way I am. Amen. And so I have to break that stuff off me by truth and resting in that I am free from fear of rejection of man or whatever, right? And so that's just a that's just an example of something that I go through or I have been through. And so you could be going through the same thing or similar, and God has this great plan for you, and you're listening to a lie of rejection that's coming from your childhood. Somebody told you you're ugly when you're young, or you were overweight, or whatever it is. And then you you regurgitate that. And then when you go to turn on your laptop or your phone to do a live stream or to teach or something, you start getting bombarded with these negative thoughts. And you listen to them. Instead, take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ, demolish that stronghold, break its power through truth. Amen. You can do all things through Christ. And if you seek him, he answers you and will deliver you from all your fear. I used to be frightened to speak in public. And God took me from like a room with like four people to like 20 people to 50 people to running programs with like 70, speaking in front of like hundreds of people, then thousands of people, then on national TV, right? Then on Fox News, and then all this. I just kept going. And then I can travel and I can speak in public to all these people and don't have a bunch of fear rejection and all that stuff. I can just embrace that I'm different. I can just embrace that God loves me. But it was a it was a process. So where is that? Ask the Lord, where is that? Where where do I start? Help me start, Lord. Help me just just help me start. Just help me start. You know, if you're stuck, you feel like you're stuck. Lord, I need a good job, I need to get education, I need this. Where do I start? Lord, I want to be healed to my feet, let's say, right? I want to be healed to my feet. Lord, I I prayed, I've I've gone to the doctor, it says this, it says that. Lord, I want to receive what's what's promised to me, that you've given me healing, you've given me deliverance, you've given me all these things. Lord, help me start. I just need some baby steps, Lord. What do you want me to do? You might be in pain, physical pain. Lord, I want to receive healing in my knee, my elbow, my eyes. Lord, where do I start? And you might not hear anything at first, but the Bible says that God answers the prayers of his people. When you pray with a sincere heart, God is going to answer you somehow. He might not come to you and say, This is what you do. It might just be a little prompting and be like, oh, or he might change you. Oh, I like eating vegetables more now. That's weird. Or you might find some supplement that God allowed somebody to bring to you or something and be like, oh, I just needed that. I didn't know. Or maybe you have a fear of going to the doctor. Maybe you just need to go. I used to be super afraid of going to the doctor, you know? And I would just blame it on like, oh, I don't believe in doctors and all that stuff. But in reality, there's fear in there. And the Lord showed me that. Uh was it uh Timothy or uh was a doctor or whatever? Or I think it was Timothy, right? And then a physician or Luke. Yeah, I'm like, oh, there's doctors. Okay, that's okay. The doctor's okay, okay, Lord, change me. Change me, Lord. Let's not say all my faith is in doctors or anything, but there's a purpose for him. God uses everything, so you don't have to be afraid because God can use a doctor, he can do things supernaturally, he can send you angels, he could send you uh this, that, he can do anything he wants at any time. So just flow with the Lord. I got a song in my heart. Flow, flow, flow with the Lord. Flow, flow, flow with the Lord. I don't know, maybe that's not a song, but it sounds good. So start flowing with the Lord instead of being afraid of all the stuff you go through. You gotta go, doctor, glory to God, glorify Jesus Christ. You gotta go uh, you know, search online for different shoes for your feet, glory and you can't afford them, glorify God. Lord, I can't afford those new shoes. You're gonna have to figure it out. If not, I'm gonna be in pain. And you love me as as your daughter, your son, and you're gonna do it for me. And watch, just watch. He'll he'll provide a way for you where there seems like there's no way. Okay. He'll always provide a way where it seems no, there's no way. And how is he gonna build your faith if you don't go through stuff? If you don't have an opportunity for your faith to grow. So instead of looking at all the negative, why don't you just go, hey, this is a horrible situation. Don't like the way I feel, Lord, but you are faithful, just like Psalm 34 says, Amen? You're faithful. I sought the Lord and He delivered me. He answered me, He delivered me from all my fears. So Jesus is going to deliver you from all your fears. And in fact, you were already delivered from all your fears 2,000 years ago. You just have to receive it and flow with the Lord to transform, to be free from all the fears. Perfect or mature, fully grown love casts out all fear. And so people come forth for prayer. I used to struggle with fear so much. I had so much fear in my body that I felt like a different, like a person was living inside of me, a fear person in my flesh. I felt like fear was inside my flesh. You ever had a panic attack? It's like that times a thousand, 24, 24, 7. Inside my flesh, I had like some sort of fear spirit or or personality or chemical imbalance. I don't really know. You can explain that. Um, I'm just gonna go with I dealt with uh uh a stronghold of fear, okay? And this spirit, which I believe it was, it was like inside my skin. I could feel it, right? Christians, Christians, uh uh, they can have whatever they agree with, okay? If you agree with fear, you're gonna deal with a stronghold of fear, okay? And you may need deliverance. You may need to submit to God and just resist the devil and he flees from you, you know? Seek the Lord, he'll show you, he will deliver you, he can deliver you from spirits of fear that have attached you somehow through your soul, through trauma, through whatever. But Christians can't be possessed by demons. They have the Holy Ghost. They can be oppressed, they can be, uh they can agree with evil spirits and take on different personalities of them and stuff. You ever seen a person that's really a Christian and they manifest different personalities? That's something to do with their soul, and they've agreed with a lie in there and the stronghold setup somehow, right? I'm not saying I know everything. Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong. I don't know. Pray about it. But what I'm trying to get at is your fear, uh, fear can be you can be delivered from fear. And I had so much fear that I uh I couldn't move sometimes. I couldn't even leave my house. I was agoraphobic. I used to have schizophrenia. How did I overcome this stuff? How did I get from dealing with schizophrenia, taking eight to 10 medications a day, going in and out of mental hospitals, doing weird things, to being on television, preaching a gospel in different nations and traveling to over like 30, 40, whatever countries? How did that happen? Was it by me because I'm a great guy? I mean, seriously. Am I delivered and healed and I I uh receive promises of God because I'm a nice person? I mean, really? Why why do I receive things from God? Why? Grace. You know, I used to be so uh so zealous and so on fire for God. You ever seen those people? They scream all the time and they're on fire for God. You have fire for God, brother. They scream, sorry, little Timmy, that's my dog. He's like, What's going on? He should have seen his ears, his ears flopped up, like because he was laying down, his ears flopped up. He's like, What's going on? Little Timmy, you want to say hi? He's ignoring me, he's going back to sleep. Okay, so I used to be one of those people that was really on fire for God. Like I have fire of God inside me, I can feel it, right? But when I was when I was young and the younger in the Lord, I had all this zealous. I was zealous, but I was doing it all because I was trying to earn things from God. I was trying to do everything and open my own doors. And you know what that did for me? It turned into rebellion because I was so self-righteous. I had a self-righteous mindset. I thought I was the one that could deliver myself from everything, that I could overcome this, I could overcome that. And I would hit walls. I would get so far. Like you could get so far being self-righteous, but eventually the law is going to come in and start showing you how much in bondage you really are in your flesh. For example, people that try to get free from uh lusty eyes, and they they try their hardest in themselves. I meet them all the time, guys. They try their hardest to get free from lusty eyes, they try their hardest to get free from internet stuff, looking at stuff on the internet. They're trying so hard. They're going to all the groups at church. They're praying, they're fasting, they're decreeing, they're declaring, and they got all this lust flaring up. They just can't quit. I knew a guy like that. He ended up not making it. He ended up going home early. He was trying so hard, did everything. He couldn't get grace. He couldn't understand he was forgiven. Self-righteousness turned to condemnation, and condemnation took him out. Don't let condemnation take you out. Don't let condemnation control you anymore. There is, therefore, no, now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus who do not walk after the flesh, but after the spirit. And you are in the spirit if the Holy Spirit lives in you. So even though you're manifesting fleshly things, you need to start transforming your mind, believing you're in the spirit, and then you will start manifesting the love of God. But the devil is telling you that you're manifesting flesh and you're not doing enough and you're not going to church enough and you're not reading enough. And so you got to do more. God's mad at you. And then pretty soon you're, God's mad at me. God's this. Oh, I'm depressed, I'm discouraged. And then you go into more sin. And then you sit there and you're like, why am I still doing this? Why am I going around the mountain? Why am I still sinning? Why am I still struggling with lustful behaviors? Why? I don't understand. And then you get mad at God. Then you go, oh, well, Christianity doesn't work for me. I'm just gonna go back to the bar. I'm not gonna go to church anymore. I'm not gonna read anymore. And then you give up on the Lord. And the Lord's still with you. But in your mind, you give up. In your heart, you're like, uh, God doesn't hear my prayers. And then you start going downhill, and then you, what they call backslidden. The only reason you're backslidden is because you believe wrong. The core, the in your core self, you need to understand that you have eternal life forever. You have been gifted eternal life, and nothing can take away eternal life from you. You can't take away your eternal life once it's been gifted to you. Okay, you have to get that in your core self to be able to walk free from things. Because if you struggle with your salvation or with um condemnation or guilt, that tells me that you don't understand grace to the fullness yet. And I'm still learning it too. Okay. You weren't saved because you were a good person. You don't maintain your salvation because you're a good person. It's a work of the Holy Spirit. Remember, I started off telling you that we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And when we're in our own selves, we manifest bad things. We can't get the breakthroughs we want. So, what's the answer? How do you do this? How do you get free from all this stuff? Surrender. Realize that in yourself you can't overcome ungodly images, smoking addictions, drug addictions. You can't overcome this stuff. Surrender your heart, just surrender your will. Lord, I can't lose weight in myself. Help me start. Lord, I can't stop staring at men or women. I can't stop lusting after this or having this identity thing. I can't do it in myself. But Lord, you live in my body and you love me. And so change me. You can do it, Lord, and I trust you. And then you'll see that you will begin to change. And you might not instantly be free from looking at dumb things on the computer. You might not be instantly free from uh uh having attractions to different people or whatever or addictions. You might not be instantly free. But I'll tell you, just like that lady years ago, the lady that I prayed for years ago, I told her your personality, your character is going to change, and God's gonna bless you with all the things that you're praying and crying about right now. Well, I don't know about that, but she kept with the Lord, she she kept on her journey, she had faith, she's saved, she was a child of God, and now look at her. She got a ministry full time, she's married, she's living her life just like she wanted when I first met her. So you want all these things, but you want them in your time, right? That's a whole nother sermon. You want these things, but they're not in your timing, or you want them in your timing. That's a whole nother type of thing you deal with. That is control. You're trying to control your own life. You know, one of the hardest things I had to learn, you know, the Lord used finances in my life a lot to teach me about my uh not trusting him. You know? Because, you know, I used to tell the Lord, Lord, you know, like Apostle Paul and Peter and them, you know, back then all you had is you just gotta find a chicken and eat it, or, you know, they didn't have cell phones, they didn't have to worry about a phone bill, they didn't have to worry about rent, you know, they all live together in like a brick house, or you could just build a house underneath a tree with some leaves or whatever, right? Like, you know, they didn't have to go to, you know, have health care or insurance or car insurance or cars. They didn't have to, uh, all these different expenses that uh we have nowadays, right? You didn't have that 2,000 years ago. I mean, it's all similar, but you know what I mean. Like, we have like a lot of to live nowadays is way different. And so I was telling the Lord, I was complaining to him. I'm like, because I complain to the Lord, but I do it in faith sometimes, you know, and sometimes I do it in unbelief. But like, I complain to me, Lord, that's not really, it's not the same. You know, you want us to trust you for everything, but like, did Apostle Paul and Peter have to trust you for a cell phone bill and an insurance payment and you know, tires for a new car, things like that. They had a horse, feed the horse, you know. But of course, there's medical stuff for horses and all that stuff too. But I'm just saying, like, if you if you understand what I'm trying to say, is that like I used to complain, Lord, like Lord, life is different back then. Like it's easier. It was easier, like life was easier. Now you have to have an income, you have to have money coming in, or you can't pay your light bill, then you don't have electricity, then your phone doesn't work. Then and I used to pray and beg the Lord, Lord, help me make money, Lord. Get what where do you want me to work, Lord? Now I want you to do ministry. And I'd argue with them, Lord, I I could be a salesman, I could sell whatever, I could, I could go sell cars and make money, I could do anything. I have administration stuff, I've started business, all sorts of Lord. I can do anything. I can be a CEO, I can do anything, Lord. Why am I, why do you want me to just do ministry and like rely on you? You know, like why am I relying on you for everything? Like, well, I could go out and make my own money. See, he was trying to get me two, two things, probably a lot of things, but one was self. I was relying on myself. Everything was me. What can I do? Not what can the Lord do? See, until you rest and trust the Lord, it's hard for him to do stuff in your life. Because you're taking you got the reins, you're you're controlling everything. And so then the control, you know, I had to learn can like let go of control. I have no control if my light bill is gonna be paid next month. I have no control if any money is gonna come my way next week or next month. I have no control over it, and it was really scary for many, many years, really scary. And so I go out and get credit cards because I need control, I need to have that ten thousand dollar limit so I can put stuff on the cards. Because you know, I need to control my life. I need to control it, okay. Are you one of those people? Are you somebody that controls? And though you've been praying about things financially, jobs, all stuff, and you're like, Lord, I don't understand. Well, maybe he's trying to get that you don't control your own life anymore. It's the Lord Jesus Christ that has purchased you with his blood, and the Holy Spirit lives in your body, and he wants to live his life through you. And he's trying to teach you to trust him. And it's really hard, it was really scary for me until finally I said, Lord, help me with baby steps. You know, help me start. And the first thing he had me do is not check money anymore in my accounts. Donations, coming in the ministry, looking, I'm just being transparent. I used to look at stuff every second, you know. He had to wean me off asking people for money. You know, I used to do the whole thing, you know, God's gonna give you a hundredfold return. You gotta tithe, you gotta do this, you gotta. He had me wean off of that. If you notice, I don't sit around and ask you for money all the time. I think we have a thing on the screen, donate support if you want. But I don't sit here and tell you you're gonna be rich if you donate to the ministry or this or that. I might mention it once in a while, you know. But like in reality, I'm just looking towards the Lord. I don't focus on that anymore. But in the beginning I did because I was trying to figure out how I was gonna control my life, how I was gonna live. And so it took me through years and years of this, years and years, seemed like forever, until stop looking at your finances every second. I mean, on my phone, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, looking all the time. What's my bank account? What's my credit cards? What's this? What's this? What's my and then I did went into crypto trading. I went into stocks, put some money in that stuff, and I kept losing. Lord, why am I losing? I bought gold, it's all excited, bought gold. Went down, then it went up like a thousand dollars or whatever. Lost money there. Why, Lord? I don't understand what's going on here. Eventually he started showing me. I bought silver. I was like, oh, we made all this money, or it's gonna go up. I need to invest, Lord, because everybody else invests. You're not everybody else, Nick. So I had to learn I have a different walk than some people. Hey, the Lord, you might be fine buying gold, silver, and crypto and all stuff. For me, right now, Lord has me do nothing. Rely on him, trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so I had to go through this whole thing. I'm different than you, you're different than me. So whatever your life is, God will teach you this. Uh uh, he'll teach you how to trust him in a different way, maybe. But for me, because I'm in ministry full-time and I'm single and all the stuff, he teaches me this way. So, yeah, I mean, you might have a family and grandkids you have to take care of. I mean, your life might be totally different. So, anyway, I'm just trying to give uh testimony. So, I had to learn like to let go of the control of my life, let go of the finances, let go of worrying about next week. I remember during COVID, I was buying food for my family, like my mom, my sister, my nephew, and uh making sure food was good because I, you know, I went to the store one time and all the toilet paper was gone, all the you know, all the food was gone in Walmart. I'm like, whoa, everything's gone. What's going on? And so I thought, well, I got to prep, I got to get all the stuff. So I started storing all this stuff. And I remember going to Costco one time, going through to shopping it was during COVID, and everybody's buying the big bag of beans and rice. There's nothing wrong with buying that stuff, but everybody's rushing to buy it. I'm like, oh yeah, I should get a big bag of beans just in case, like, I can't buy any food. And so I went up there to get the beans, and I remember the Lord speaking to my heart. When did I ever tell you that I was gonna not feed you? And it really convicted me. It was it was a nice, nice way he said it. But it was conviction, like, oh, I'm not trusting the Lord. I'm not telling you not to buy extra food for your family and prepare for bad times. That's fine. But I was going to an extreme. I was doing because I was trying to control and I was doing out of fear. See, there's different motives, right? So the Holy Spirit, the Word of God, knows your motives in your heart. So somebody could buy bags of beans and save it up for their family or doing it in their heart, no big deal. But me, I was in fear and I was in control issues. See? So what's lawful for me or lawful for you is different sometimes with people, right? Because it's a personal walk with the Lord Jesus Christ. He knows how to train you, he knows how to train uh me. And we all have different walks. So you can't say, well, Nick does this and Nick does that, no, or Nick can't do that or this or whatever, and I'm not gonna do that. You can't mold your everything after my walk with the Lord. You need to have your own personal relationship with the Lord and let him take you down your narrow road. Because our narrow roads are all similar but different. You know, you could have different life situations than I. You could have five kids. I don't have five kids. You so God's gonna train you differently how to trust and how to, you know, uh trust them for finances, how to do all that stuff, right? So your life is different than mine. But we all walk on the same narrow road. It's just a little bit different the areas we're in and how God trains us on that road. And so be aware of how he's training you. And if you struggle, just start with baby steps and stop condemning yourself. And one thing I used to always deal with was you're not doing enough. And it was hard. And God took me through years of not feeling like I do enough. I'm not doing enough. I'm not doing enough. And I thought, well, if I do a lot of ministry, then the Lord's gonna bless me financially. He's gonna owe me. He's gonna owe me if I do a lot of ministry, he's gonna owe me if I give a lot of money. And then I'd hit a wall. Lord, I'm tired. I'm tired, Lord. I've done all this stuff for you, and where is the benefit of it all? And I'd rebel and I just want to go sit at a bar or rebel and go uh sit at a bar and backslide, you know, like that was the feelings I was getting, getting discouraged. You know, and you might be there, you might be like, well, this is I'm just gonna rebel because there's nothing else going on. Well, I'll tell you, God will be with you. Rebellion doesn't help, it just prolongs, it sucks, it's pointless. Just remain with the Lord and just tell him, Lord, this is what I'm dealing with. Lord, this is what I'm dealing with. I need help. Show me the baby steps, help me with the emotional stuff, you know, and he'll dig you out of it. See, it's about having a heavenly father that cares about you. And it's amazing that we're sons and daughters of God, like we really are. Like you can talk to God like He's your father, your friend. He's not far away from you. It's awesome, it's amazing. Like knowing God is like uh it's surreal because other people don't know God. So, like, think about you you meet people like around town. They live with some people live without ever praying, they live without knowing God at all. And here I am just chatting with the Lord, laughing, and the Holy Ghost, driving down the road with little Timmy in the back seat. We're just laughing. Or I'm just laughing, he's he's a he's a dog, but he maybe laughs, I don't know. But you know what I mean? And then there's other people drive down the street and have zero relationship with God. That scares me. It's very sad. And so that's why I have a passion to share the gospel with people because I can't imagine I don't even remember what it was like when I was younger and I didn't pray all the time. I don't remember that. It's like a whole different person. I feel like I prayed some when I was young. Like there's people that never think about God, never think about eternity. Pray for those people. They they they have no life. Zero. You could be a trillionaire, a billionaire, and have zero life living in you. Zero. It's very sad. Come to Jesus, it's your time. Psalm 34. Uh I sought the Lord and he answered me, he delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to him are radiant with joy. Their faces shall never be ashamed. This poor man called out, and the Lord heard him. He saved him from all his troubles. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him, and he delivers them. Taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. So you're blessed as you take refuge in the Lord. You're struggling, take refuge in the Lord. You got diagnosed with the disease, take refuge in the Lord. You're afraid, take refuge in the Lord. You feel like discouragement, take refuge in the Lord. Encourage yourself with Psalm 34 with the word of God. Taste and see that the Lord, the Lord is good. So today I want you to repent completely, just completely change your mind to ever think God has a negative thing in him, that your heavenly father has anything negative in him or any bad motives about your life. I used to think God would bless other people and he would forget about me as like kind of like a joke because I'm not loved like that other person. Like I used to think, like I used to like accuse God of not being good. You know, you have to remember that I came from uh, you know, I came from uh a lot of trauma when I was young, a lot of rebellion, rejection. I had huge rejection personality, trauma, you know, I went through a lot of stuff. And so when I got saved and I started encountering the Holy Spirit, I didn't, you know, I'm ashamed, not ashamed of it. Yeah, I mean, I feel bad about it now, but like I was really young. God had to grow me up and I would I would yell and I'd get mad at God all the time. I mean, I really feel bad about it now, but like I was really just rejected. I felt so rejected in my emotions when I used to deal with schizophrenia and everything. I used to just rebel and yell at God and throw things in the room and stuff like that. I mean, not real bad. I was never like a violent person, but you know what I mean? Like, um, yeah, I used to get really mad at the Lord, and it all came from a false belief system that the devil was feeding me my whole life. And so I thought God was hiding himself from me. You know, I thought God was hiding, not answering prayers for me because he didn't really like me. He liked everybody else. I hope that helps somebody out there. All right. Taste and see that the Lord is good. 30, uh, this is 30 uh 4, Psalm 34, 8. Taste and see the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. We'll finish up here. Fear the Lord, you his saints. Okay, so you be in awe of the Lord, you his saints. So you want to reverence the Lord, honor the Lord, okay? You his saints, for those who fear him lack nothing. So when you reverence the Lord, when you're in awe of the Lord and you reverence him, that fear, that reverence of God, you fear, you you lack nothing. Okay. Young lions go lacking hungry, but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing. That's a promise. You you seek the Lord, you follow Jesus, you're gonna lack no good thing. Okay. That's a truth that you have to renew your mind on to receive. So you have to renew your mind on the truth to receive the promises of God. Okay. But it it's automatic. So these these things are automatic. So if you seek the Lord, he's gonna give you good things. It's automatic. It's an odd, this stuff is automatic. Because that's God's character, He just pours out goodness, goodness, goodness, goodness, goodness. He just keeps pouring out goodness on you. And the goodness of God leads man to repentance. And so I have repented of things in my life, changed, you know, had a heart transformation, had a mind transformation, let go of sin, different types of things. Not because God was uh threatening me with throwing me in the lake of fire if I didn't shape up as a son, but God just kept pouring his goodness on me and kept encouraging me down the road, kept sending me people, kept encouraging, you know, like when I was at the end of my rope, God would send me encouragement. You know, I didn't think I could make it anymore. You know, God, God sent me encouragement. You know, I'd rebel and go do dumb things. God would still keep pouring his goodness on me. And I thought, wow, God is so good. And now he's just changed me so much that like I know he's good. I don't understand why I ever did anything bad in the past. You know what I mean? Just because I was messed up in my mind, I went in my emotions and I got discouraged and I just started doing dumb things. Right? Now I'm like, God's good. All that stuff's stupid. Why would I ever do that? But it was God's goodness that brought me back to that right relationship with him. You know, that brought me back. You know, you know, somebody backslidden that's really a Christian, you know, God's trying to be good to that person to help them, you know, and they get chastened, they'll go through chastening. I went through chastening, been through chastening, but it was his goodness through the chastening that brought me back. And I saw his goodness. I was like, oh, praise God. Praise God. God is faithful. Okay. Come, children, listen to me. I will teach you the fear of the Lord. Who is the man who delights in life, who desires to see good days? Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from deceitful speech. Turn away from evil and do good, seek peace and pursue it. That's basically what I'm saying. Turn away from evil, do good, seek peace and pursue it. David's encouraging us, hey, turn from evil. Evil ain't gonna help you any. Doing dumb things ain't gonna help you. It's just gonna bring ruin into your life. Speaking evil about your spouse and arguing and and uh uh being judgmental and bitter towards people and living in unforgiveness, that is not helping you in your life. So just by grace, change your mind, and God will help you. If you confess your sins and forsake Him, He gives you mercy. So confess it. Lord, I struggled with this or I did this and forsake it, Lord. By your grace, I can just forsake this stuff because it's dumb. See? It doesn't lead to good things. Hurting other people, sinning against people and against God and yourself only hurts you. It's well, it hurts others, but it doesn't help you. Bad behaviors always equal bad consequences. That's why I tell my nephew, I've been telling him since he was a kid. You know, you do bad behaviors, it's gonna be bad consequences. You know, you steal from somebody, you go to prison. You don't steal from somebody, and then all of a sudden you're, you know, super blessed and happy and joyful. Now you got guilt and shame, condemnation, and they'll come get you and throw you in prison. So why go that way? Let's not steal from people. It's very easy, right? That's easy. That's an easy thought process. Well, if I steal, bad consequences. If I live a good life and bless people, I'll be blessed. It's really simple. And with grace, you can do it. If you struggle, that's when you call on the name of the Lord and you relax and you realize that God's changing you. You're just programmed and you were struggling that way. You need help, and God's with you. He loves you, he cares about you. I could preach all day. I'm gonna I'm gonna end here pretty soon. I just said that earlier. Keep your tongue from evil, turn away from evil, do good, seek peace and pursue it. So you're supposed to be seeking peace, okay? The Lord is your peace. You're supposed to be seeking peace with your loved ones, with your friends, with your coworkers. Seek peace, pursue it. The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous. So why are we righteous? Because we're great people. No, Jesus Christ makes us righteous, and his ears are inclined to their cry. So anytime you're crying and you're calling on the name of the Lord, his ears aren't closed, like I used to think when I was, you know, when I was young in the Lord and had a bunch of trauma I was trying to process, right? No. His ears are not closed when you're crying. The Lord hears you in your trouble. It's not like he doesn't hear you. It says his ears are inclined to the righteous' cry. You're righteous because of Jesus, but the devil, the world system, wants to make you think that you're not righteous because you did something dumb or you said something stupid or you're struggling. See, you got to start thinking you're righteous and that you're forever saved. Righteous and forever saved because Jesus Christ chose me. Somehow He chose me to believe in Him. Praise God. It has nothing to do with me. When you get off yourself, walking with the Lord's a lot easier. Amen. Okay. Uh He delivers me from all their troubles. Uh the righteous crowd and the Lord hears, he delivers them from all their troubles. All their troubles. You got trouble, the Lord will deliver you from it. You got trouble, the Lord will deliver you from it. Hear me. If you have trouble, the Lord will deliver you from it. Why? Because you're a great person? No, because Jesus Christ. It's all about him. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted. He saves the contrite in spirit. So you have a broken heart, you've dealt with rejection. Let's say your spouse left you, cheated on you, hurt you. Let's say you had church hurt. Uh, you got, you know, your kids don't want to, your adult children don't want anything to do with you. Um, whatever. You're brokenhearted. You've been hurting your soul. You've been traumatized by something, you went through something. The Lord is there for you, He's near to you. Many are the afflictions of the righteous. Okay, say that with me. Many, write that in the comments if you're there. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, okay? This is what I want to do. Thank you, Lord. That's that's one of the ones I really wanted to read. I'm so glad I found it. Remember, I was typing that? I realized that this is the similar one, but this is exactly perfect, Lord. You're so faithful. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, okay? So if you look at King David's life, how many afflictions did he go through? He went through Saul, he went through his own son, going through all that stuff. He went through hiding from Saul, he went through uh the thing with Bathsheba. He went through all a lot of stuff, okay? Uh Goliath, he had to go through all these things. So he went through all these afflictions. He had to go through war, he had to go through all the stuff. He went through a lot of afflictions. Joseph went through a lot of affliction in prison. Paul, Peter persecuted. Peter was crucified upside down, supposedly, before or after watching his wife get crucified, I think. Paul was beheaded. Matthew was filleted alive in India, supposedly. Skinned. I mean, all sorts of stuff. These men and women of God, they were killed horribly. Many afflictions, right? Many afflictions people go through. Imprisonments, different countries right now. There's people in prison. Uh uh jihadists are coming in and killing Christians in different churches in different parts of Africa, different places in the world. You're in North Korea, you don't have, you know, you don't have a church you can go to. Many are the afflictions, the persecution of the righteous, right? So there's a lot of afflictions you're going to go through. So just accept that as a fact. Okay. You will go through afflictions in life. Some are worse than others. Okay? But the Lord delivers him from them all. Praise God. And then it then it goes into uh prophecy about Jesus Christ. He protects all his bones, not one of them will be broken. Remember, Jesus was never had a broken bone. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him from them all. Amen. That can also be prophetic for Jesus as well. Okay. So many are the afflictions of the righteous. So just accept that there are afflictions as a Christian. Jesus said, if those that you want to uh uh live a righteous life for him, you'll be persecuted and hated. Just accept that. That's what Jesus said. People will persecute you if you follow the Lord and want to live a godly life. You might get persecuted by your family, your neighbors, uh, the government, uh your school, who knows, your business. You'll be persecuted if you live, if you want to live a good life, a righteous life. So just accept these things, but know that God will deliver you from them all through Jesus Christ your Lord. So write down what those afflictions are. Maybe you're dealing with health issues, bone, your bones hurt, maybe your eyesight, maybe it's your uh, I don't know, finances, car, maybe what are the afflictions? You you you know, you haven't seen your kids for a while, your adult children, they don't call you, whatever it is. Afflictions, write them down. And then declare Psalm 34. Lord, I believe that you're gonna deliver me from every single affliction. I believe it, Lord. I don't know when this is gonna, I don't know when I'm gonna get new tires for my car. I don't know when my knees are gonna get healed. I don't know when this uh diagnosis is gonna go away. I don't know when it's gonna change. But Lord, you are faithful to me. You are always faithful, you are always good, and you care about me. Praise God. Amen. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him from them all. He protects all his bones, not one of them will be broken. Evil will slay the wicked, and the haters of the righteous will be condemned. The Lord redeems his servants, and none who take refuge in him, refuge in him will be condemned. Okay? So the answer there is taking refuge in Jesus Christ the Messiah. That's the answer. Amen. That's your answer. Taking refuge in Jesus Christ. Every single issue in your life, every single thing you need, like Marie uh Marisella Sanchez on YouTube asked for prayer. Her answer is taking refuge in the Lord Jesus Christ and believing, Psalm 34, that God hears the prayers of the righteous. God hears the prayers of the righteous. Lord, we pray for Maricella and we ask, Lord, that you would open up her heart and her mind to see the goodness of God in the land of the living, just like you did for King David, that you that as she believes in Jesus Christ the Messiah, that faith, that faith would come inside of her and that she would receive the answer to her prayer, whatever that may be, Lord. We agree with her, Lord, for your will to be done in this situation in her life, and that your angels would move on behalf of our prayers and her prayer. And whatever uh she needs, Lord, I know that you're there for her. And we thank you, Lord, for helping Marisella. In Jesus' name, amen. So the answer is Jesus of Nazareth, and that's my sermon for today. All right, guys. Well, thank you so much for joining. Uh thank you for your support and ministry. Love you so much. Hopefully, uh you like this is uh Spirit Stream 67. Next time it's Spirit Stream 68. Bye-bye. We want to help you grow as close as you can to the Lord Jesus, as well as grow in your identity as a son or daughter of the Most High God. We have books and resources at our website as well. You can go to our online store, you can get my book, Defeating Mental Illness. I have it in uh uh English, Spanish, Hmong language, Ukrainian, and French, okay, currently. And then we also have Becoming God's Friend, which is my autobiography. I have it in English and Spanish for you, as well as an ebook and audiobook, and 30 Days to Believing Right, which is a devotional, which will help, uh, I believe will help you with your identity in Christ Jesus and believe correctly about who you are. Okay, because God really loves you, He cares about you. Uh, so check out our website, thefathersfriends.org. If you feel led to become a monthly partner, you can do that at the website. 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