Viola Solid Rock Assembly
Blessed Life 1
Today, I feel like we need to shift a little bit from the direction that we've been going. I still think and believe that hearing from the voice of God and hearing the voice of God and stacking stones is something that we are going to focus on, not just for the rest of this year, but going forward. But the last couple of weeks I've had a phrase that's just been rolling around in my mind and in my heart and the phrase, and I just couldn't get away from it with phrases blessed life. And there was a book written several years ago called that. And so anyways, I started reading that book again. I've read it several times, but you know, we all want to have a blessed life, right? If I went around the room, every one of you would say, I want to have a blessed life. And being blessed is having supernatural power working in your favor, right? We all want the right. We all want God to work on our behalf, right? We don't want to, we don't want to just go through life and God never show up, right? I don't plan on when I pray for things and pray that God shows up in situations and circumstances. I don't just pray empty prayers and expecting nothing. I expect God to move. And part of a blessed life is seeing God move in the supernatural on our behalf. And I know some of you are already starting to clench up, and you're already like, "He's going to preach about money." Well, you're partially right. But let me just, before we get started, let me give you some food for thought. In your Bible, in your New Testament, 16 of Jesus's 38 parables deal with stewardship, one out of 10 verses in the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, 288 of them deal with money. In your Bible, there are 500 verses on prayer and 500 verses on faith, but there are 2,000 verses on money. I would say that it's important to God. Being blessed doesn't just apply to money though. It is going to be something that we hit on today, but it doesn't just apply to money. It applies to every aspect of your life. There are four separate times in Deuteronomy that God says He will bless everything you touch if you obey Him. And really, that is a blessed life, right? If everything that I touch or put my hand to is blessed, that's living a blessed life. Deuteronomy chapter 14 is the first place that we see Him say this. We're going to begin in verse 22 of Deuteronomy chapter 14, verse 22. It says, "You must set aside a tithe of your crops one tenth of all the crops you've harvest each year. Bring the tithe to the designated place of worship, the place the Lord your God chooses for His name to be honored and eat it there in His presence. This applies to your tithes of grain, new wine, olive oil, and the first born males of your flocks and herds. Do this. Doing this will teach you always to fear the Lord your God. Now when the Lord your God blesses you with a good harvest, the place of worship He chooses for His name to be honored might be too far for you to bring your tithe. If so, you may sell the tithe portion of your crops and herds and put the money in a pouch and go to the place the Lord your God has chosen." Verse 27, "And do not neglect the Levites in your town, for they will receive no allotment of land among you. And at the end of every third year, bring the entire tithe of last of that year's harvest and stored in the nearest town. Give it to the Levites who will receive no allotment of land among you, as well as to the foreigners living among you in the orphans and the widows in your town, so that they can eat and be satisfied. And then Lord your God will bless you in all your work." Tithing is the key that unlocks blessings and releases protection. It unlocks blessings here. He says, "Set aside a tithe of your crop, one tenth of all crops." And he says, he goes on and says, "Now when the Lord your God blesses you with a good harvest, his name will be honored." And then the last verse, the last part of verse 29 says, "Then the Lord your God will bless you in all your work if you do this. If you take the tithe and you take it to the storehouse, you'll bless us." Right? That's what it says. Malachi chapter 3 verse 10 says, "Bring all the tithes in the storehouse so there will be enough food in my temple. If you do, says the Lord of Heaven's army, I will open the windows of heaven for you. I will pour out a blessing so great you won't have enough room to take it in. Try it. Put me to the test. This is the only place in scripture that God says, "Test me. Test me and see." It's his anyways, right? It's his and he'll give it back. When we give what's his back, he will bless us. His promise is to rebuke the devourer. Verse 11 says, "Your crops will be abundant for I will guard them from the insects and disease. Your grapes will not fall from the vine before the arrival says the Lord of Heaven's armies. When you tithe, you release the Lord's protection. And there are three things that as a believer that we should be participating in and practicing, tithing, praying and fasting and praying and fasting is not the same thing. It's two separate things just so you know. Just want to share that. Those three things though, in my opinion, are cornerstones of faith. And if we are not practicing those three things as believers, we're missing out on something. I encourage you to fast at some point during the week. You can fast a meal. You can fast something, but do it for a day and see if something doesn't change in your life. Begin to pray consistently. Hey, guess what? We have times that you can come and pray as a group on Tuesday nights and Thursday mornings. Try tithing. I promise it won't hurt. The first time God says I'll bless everything you put your hand to in Deuteronomy, though he's speaking specifically of tithing. And if you tithe, if you give the first spruce, I believe that's pretty significant that it's the first thing he talks about that it's essentially set up for the promised land. We're getting ready to go into the promised land. And the first thing I'm going to bless all your hand comes right after he says if you tithe. It's pretty significant, right? And I know that people try to argue, well, that's an Old Testament thing. Okay. When Jesus came, he did away with the law, right? No. He said, I didn't come to do a way with the law, but to add to the law. And every time someone comes to him with something about the law, he would say do that and do more. He says forgive your neighbor. Don't just forgive him once. Seven times seven. Let's keep going. Give it more. So if that's the case, if we're going to say, well, Jesus did away with law even though he didn't, but if we're going to say that and we're going to live by the new covenant, then timing is just the minimum we should be doing more. Just saying, take it or leave it. I promise it won't hurt. There's two questions that are often asked. How much shall I give? How much shall I keep? There are five things that I want you to consider. First, if I give nothing, I'm voting to close the doors of the church because I don't believe it's important. If you choose to give nothing, that's what you're saying. You're coming in and into the house of the Lord. And if you choose to do nothing, you're saying it's not valuable. It's not important. If I only give a token, not a tithe, I vote to not do missions, outreach, soul winning, or anything else required to fulfill the Great Commission. If I give grudgingly or simply for the necessities, I'll miss the joy of giving and don't know the power of a cheerful giver. If I refuse to give regularly, I'm not obedient to biblical principles and the truth about the tithe being the first fruit, not an afterthought. Listen, if you don't like to today, you can take it up with God, but that will mean you will have to pray because it's one of the cornerstones. But if I give less than 10%, the next thing is, if I give less than 10% the tithe, then I'm disobeying the word of Jesus. And I'm showing less respect, honor, and love for the Lord than the Jews did for the law. Jesus gets onto the Pharisees and he says, you guys tied over the most measly things, but you're not taking the rest and love and grace and loving people and loving your neighbor. Do both. Love your neighbor. Love the people you don't like. Antath. That's what Jesus said. If you aren't tithing, giving 10% consistently, I want to challenge you to start. Put God to the test and see. Put God to the test and see if things don't change in your life. The second blessing that he talks about in Deuteronomy in chapter 15 verse 10, he says, give generously to the poor, not grudgingly for the Lord, your God will bless you in everything you do. He talks about tithing first and then in chapter 15, he says, give to the poor. Giving to the poor is something that we do and don't realize it. The poor, the orphans, the widows, when we give the missions projects, when you sow into an outreach, when you're giving to the poor, when you give to missions here, we send money to compact ministries down in hot springs who takes care of orphans. Every month we send money to them. Every month we send money over to missionaries and most of our missionaries work in some way, former fashion work with children in the countries that they're in and they work with the poor and they work with orphans and widows and when we give to missions, we are supporting and giving to the poor. I am telling you this because I want you to know what you're giving to. When you give to an outreach, what are we doing? We're reaching our community, right? Do you think that everyone that comes in here is okay or do you think some people that come through our out churches might be poor? We do this, sometimes not even realizing it. When we give, we're blessing others, right? Deuteronomy chapter 28 tells the next one, it says, "The Lord will guarantee a blessing on everything you do will fill your storehouses with grain. The Lord your God will bless you in the land where he is giving you. If you obey the commands of the Lord your God and walk in his ways, the Lord will establish you as holy people as he swore he would do. Then all the nations of the world will see that you are a people claimed by the Lord and that you will stand in awe of you. The Lord will give you prosperity and the land he swore to your ancestors to give you blessings, blessing you with many children, numerous livestock and abundant crops. The Lord will send rain at the proper time for his rich treasury in the heavens and will bless all of your work that you do. You will lend to many nations but you will never need to borrow from them. If you listen to these commands of the Lord your God and for that I am giving you today and if you carefully obey them, the Lord will make you the head and not the tail and you will always be on top and never the bottom and you will must not turn away from any of the commands I'm giving you today nor follow any other gods and worship them." He says, "I guarantee a blessing on everything you do and will fill your storehouses with grain but there's an if." He says, "If you obey the commands of the Lord your God and walk in his ways, I'm guaranteeing a blessing on you if you obey me. If you do what I'm asking you to do I guarantee a blessing." That's a promise. That's not a, that's a money back guarantee James. He says, "I guarantee it." This is guarantee is better than Walmart's guarantee. It's better than all those, you know, lifetime warranty, guarantee tools that break and then you can't find nobody to honor the guarantee warranty. Y'all know what I'm talking about. It's guaranteed, I guarantee that if you obey and you do what I'm asking you to do then I will fill your storehouses. The Lord will guarantee a blessing on everything we do. Every aspect of our lives, our health, our relationships, work, our family, our emotions, our thoughts, our business endeavors, everything that we put our hand to if we obey his commands, he will bless us. That's a blessed life, right? If we walk out what he speaks to us, if we do what he says, if we respond when he speaks and act on it, then we'll walk a blessed life and it goes back to what we've been saying all year long that when God speaks we won't act, when we hear his voice we need to move. Why? Because it's obeying his word and if we do what he's asking us to do we will be blessed. If God comes to me and asks me to do something David and I say no, I didn't, I lost blessing, I gained curses. Are you going to be obedient when he speaks? Are you going to be obedient when he speaks? I was reading a story this week about a guy that God began to deal with him about some, just giving and giving, not just giving tithe or offerings but just giving to people, blessing people. And so God, he said, I don't know how I'm going to do this and he was at a church preaching and he got done preaching and someone came up and handed him some money and he stuck it in his pocket and God told him as soon as he stuck it in pocket, it's not for you, it's for someone else. He said okay God. And it started a chain of events. It was every time someone handed him cash he gave it away because God spoke to his heart about who to give it to and how to give it. And then it went from there, it turned into cars. In an 18 month span he gave away and received 10 cars. He would give one away and within two weeks he'd have another one in the driveway that someone gave to him and he would give it away and it just continued for 18 months like that. It didn't always happen that they would give it to him and the next day he would give it away but it happened that he would just, they would begin to pray, who do I need to give this to? How do I need to give it? And they did. And then he got to the towards the end the last vehicle that they got, God said you're not going to give this in a way you're going to sell it. And he said hold on you're changing the rules. And so he said he went to a church and he got to the church and this guy walks up to him and he says, he said to him he said hey I heard you might be wanting to sell a van and he's like I hadn't told anyone. The only person that I told was my wife. And the guy said God told me to give you a certain amount for the vehicle and it was the amount that God told him to sell it for. And so he sold the van, took the money, put it in the bank, said okay God now what? They went on a mission strip two weeks later and they were in, they were on the field with the missionary and they were driving around and the vehicle the missionary had was just falling apart. And he said why don't you get another vehicle and he said well I've already found one. And he took this guy to the car lot to show him the vehicle that he had found. Twelve thousand US dollars which is exactly the amount that he had sold the vehicle for. He wrote a check, gave it to the missionary, provided another vehicle and it goes on and on and he tells about this time that he was at a church and I felt him. He was an evangelist and he said well I was at this, I was going to this church and it was the only time, the only meeting I had that whole month. And he said I'd really stressing out about it. I've been there, I know what he was feeling. And he said at the end of the meeting the pastor walked up and he said brother I just want to tell you that this is the biggest offering that we have ever given to anyone and I just hope it really blesses you. And it was his entire month's budget and that one meeting. And as he put the check in his pocket God told him you've got to give it away. He said God. And at the beginning of the service there was a missionary that had just shared a brief window of an update for the church and so God had told him to give it to that missionary. So I looked around the sanctuary and made sure no one else was there. The missionary was still, he was picking up his stuff and he said he walked up to him and I said this is for you. I've already signed it over to you. He said he got to the restaurant after the after the service and they cleaned everything up or whatever and they got to the restaurant and this guy was sitting across from him that he had met at the church but didn't really know him and he he leans in and he says how much was your offering. He said it caught me off guard and I didn't want to answer and so he said but it caught me so off guard that I just told him and then the guy said I want to see the check and he said I gave it to my wife and he said here I am preached the gospel and then I'm lying to the guy because I'm like I don't want to tell him that I just gave it away. And so he gets he goes down to his because the guy said well go get it and so he goes down to his wife and he says how's your meal you know she left it in the car we'll go get it. He said okay I gave it away and he said I already knew that he said God already told me that you had given it away he said because he's about to teach you something right here he said he's about to teach you something about giving and he slid a check across the table and it was 10 times the offering that it came in. Because God blesses when he speaks and when we're obedient to when he speaks God will bless and we don't always see the blessings how we want to see them. There are times that we do things and God ask us to give and ask us to do hard things and we don't see the blessings right away and we get discouraged and we're like why can't we be like that. That guy gave away a car and two weeks later he got another car you know immediately he gave the check and God gave him more. But it comes in other ways and throughout my life and throughout my ministry I've seen God do that time and time again where he spoke specifically and told me to do something and I didn't see the return for sometimes years. I remember a specific time that God told me to sell a vehicle and give the money to missions and I did. I didn't see a return on that for 15 years. But 15 years later God brought it back to my memory when we were didn't know what we were going to do and a guy showed up in a church parking lot and left the title and keys to a car with the church and told the pastor to call me because it was mine. When he called me and told me he needed to see me I was kind of worried. I was evangelist. I thought I'd done something wrong and somebody had called him on me. The Lord will guarantee a blessing on everything we do if we are obedient to him. If we walk when he speaks if we respond and act on what he tells us we'll walk a blessed life. Does walking a blessed life mean nothing bad will ever happen? No. That doesn't mean things won't happen. Things will still happen because we live in a corrupt and fallen world. What it does mean though is what Roman 828 says and we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose. It means that when bad things happen good will come out of it. It means that when we get knocked down so to speak God is there to pick us up and help us along the way. When we're walking a blessed life the bad things that happen sometimes aren't so bad. I've had things that look bad in the moment turn into something great in the long run. Listen that hailstorm was terrible. Terrible and we are still eating the effects of it but let me tell you something. We got new siding and new paint and things look different outside and people drive by all the time and call me and say man it looks great and it's because we wouldn't have been able to do that had the hailstorm not happened. I'm just telling you. It was bad but God blessed us through it. The flood was terrible but y'all got a remodeled bathroom out of that flood women. Walking out the blessed life doesn't mean that we'll have the newest fanciest flashiest car or the newest biggest phone out or the hippest close. What it does means is our needs are met and we are comfortable and we are not wanting. We're happy. It doesn't mean you're going to drive around red Ferrari. It means you're blessed. Walking a blessed life starts with walking and obedience. It starts with obedience. We talked about the key is tithing but tithing is walking out obedience. It's about obedience and everything that we do and everything that when it comes to God and it comes to His blessings and it comes to what He's going to do in our life it all starts with a yes from us. And you might be saying well God doesn't speak to me. I promise you if you listen He'll speak. Too many times we don't give God enough credit we think all is just my own mind. You don't think about stuff like that. You're not that nice. That taco wasn't that bad to give you that kind of dream. That was God. That was God speaking to you. That was God telling you to do something. It's not always comfortable. I can attest it's not always comfortable. But I know that there's a blessing at the end because I'm walking in obedience. I want, I want to live a blessed life. I want for you to live a blessed life. I want for your family to live a blessed life. It starts with obedience. My skid Rowan that would just stand your feet. Who would I thank you for today? I thank you for what you're doing in this house. I thank you for what you've done Lord. I thank you for blessing us God. You have blessed us. We are a blessed people. Lord I believe that there's more. I believe that you have so much more for us. And so Lord I pray that you begin to move in this house and you begin to speak to hearts right now God. That you begin to do what only you can do. Maybe you're here in this room and God's been speaking to you and you're wondering the how. You've said I will do it God but I don't know how. I want to invite you to come. I want to pray with you and believe with you. It doesn't matter what it is that he's speaking. He's been speaking to you about something and you're wondering the how. I want to invite you to come. I want to pray with you. Maybe you haven't been being completely obedient. Maybe you know God's been speaking to you and for whatever reason you haven't been completely obedient. You say today I'm ready to be obedient. I'm ready to submit to what he's asking me to do. I want to invite you to come. Maybe you just say I want to live a blessed life. I want to live a blessed life. I want to be obedient when he speaks. I want to invite you to come. I want to pray with you. I want to believe with you. What are you waiting on? God's dealing with your heart to be here. What are you waiting on? Lord, I just pray right now for the ones that responded. Lord, I know that there's some more that need to be here this morning. Lord, I pray that you just begin to move on their hearts even now, God. Lord, that you begin to move on their hearts even now. Lord, we want to walk out and live a blessed life. We want to be obedient when you speak God. Lord, I pray that you begin to move and you begin to touch right now. Right now. If you feel led to come and pray around this altar, feel free to do so.