Mount Olive First PHC
As We See The Day Approaching
[MUSIC PLAYING] Welcome to Mount Olive's first Pentecostal Holiness Church. Thank you for connecting with us. In just a moment, Pastor Jeff will be sharing an uplifting and encouraging message that we pray will inspire you in your walk with God. Our desire at M-O-F-P-H-C is for you and your family to find hope in Jesus Christ so that he will transform your life. Thanks again for connecting with us. Please contact us if we can help you discover God's purpose for your life. Enjoy the message. Thankful for his presence. Well, I want to just first of all say to you all, you know, a lot of pastors or preachers when they start the message and say they love you. It's like, get ready. But I just want to say this. Truly, I love each and every one of you. And I'm thankful to be a part of a loving church. And I'm also thankful to be part of a praying church. I appreciate you praying for me, praying for our staff, praying for our families. Thank God for people that pray. And I hope you want your pastor praying. And I'm praying. I feel like that that is all my life is. It's always a prayer. God help me. You remember Peter when he was walking on water, Lord, Lord, help me. I feel like that's my prayer at all times. Lord, help me. But in my prayer time this week, it was amazing because I was praying for this day as we would gather together. God, what would you want to say to Mount Ola 1st, P8's church? That's really my prayer and my desire every week. Lord, what would you want to say that's going to be relevant to where we are as a church? And in my prayer time, God was moving me in a certain direction. And then on Wednesday, I just felt the Lord began to prompt me on some things. And I really wasn't sure if it was just for me, maybe, or for the church. And you have to pray and ask God, give the sermon there. Give wisdom on-- if this was for me personally, or is it for the church. And then I was kind of forcing my way into another direction, opposite of what the Lord was wanting. And then Friday morning. And by Friday morning, I'm hoping and praying, God's already put it there. But sometimes it's later on on Fridays and going into the weekend. And that really testes your faith. But on Friday, the Lord put me back, prompting me and putting six words on my heart. And those six words are as we see the day approaching. As we see the day approaching. Now, in that prayer time, I believe the Lord was directing me to share with you today a message, but also over the next couple of weeks a series of messages that are connected to these six words as we see the day approaching. So if you will, just pray for me as I listen to the Lord and just pray that our hearts would be open to what God would want to say as we see the day approaching. Now, those six words are found in the book of Hebrews. I want you to open your Bible to Hebrews chapter 10. Hebrews chapter 10. And your homework assignment this week is to go back and read that chapter in context. Read the entire chapter. But I have one verse I want to read to you today. Hebrews 10.25 is where we find those six words as it really says as you see the day approaching. Some say as we see the day approaching. But here's what Hebrews 10.25 says. Let us not give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing. In other words, he's talking about keep coming to church, stay faithful to church. Let us not give up meeting together. That's this church service, church gathering. As some are in the habit of doing. But let us encourage one another and all the more. As you see the day approaching. As you see the day approaching. What day is the writer here talking about? What day? Well, what he means by as we see the day approaching that day that he's referring to is the day that the Lord Jesus was going to return. How many of you know Jesus was coming back? He came one time and he's coming again. A second coming is an imminent return to soon coming king. When he says as we see the day approaching, that day means the day of the Lord's return. So as we see the day approaching, we should come to church faithfully. And everybody said, we should come to church faithfully because we need each other. As we see the day approaching, as we see the coming of the Lord coming soon, we need to come to church faithfully because we need each other. There is a lot of reasons why we come to church. But one of the main reasons why we come is what it says here in Hebrews 1025. And that is that we are to come to church to encourage one another. We should come to church. I love the the passion translation says, we should be eager to gather together to encourage one another. We should be eager to encourage one another because encouragement comes from what D.L. Moody would say, encouragement, it helps us to grow and it helps us to grow. I love that. When we come together and we encourage one another, we encourage one another to grow in the Lord and to glow for the Lord. Come if you want to grow in the Lord and glow for the Lord, amen. And sometimes we need encouragement to be able to do that. We should come to church. We should come to church eager to encourage one another onward in Christ. We should come to church eager to encourage one another as the Bible says to encourage one another to stay true to Jesus Christ. Listen, if you look at what's going on in the world today, come on, it's dark, it's disappointing and the church, the church should be the place that we go and come out encouraged. I mean, I thought I'd get an amen right there. When we come in here, we are the, when we leave, we are to go out different than we came in. We are, if you come in discouraged this morning, you are to go out and encourage today, encourage because of the presence of God here and God's people here. We should come to church and encourage one another. This is the place that we come to encourage one another. Come out better than we went in. As we see the day approaching, let us encourage one another. How many of you've ever needed some encouragement before in your life? If you don't have your hand up, lie our, lie our pants on fire. We all need encouragement in our life. I wonder if you can think of a time when somebody encouraged you, when maybe you needed encouragement and you can think of a time when somebody came and brought encouragement to you, somebody maybe said a word to you or showed up just at the right time to encourage you when you were going through a hard time in your life. You see, encouragement is powerful and encouragement comes to us in many ways. So what is encouragement? Well, look at that root word there, you see courage. Encouragement means to give courage to someone. Give courage to someone. It means to give confidence to someone. It means to give hope to someone. It means to inspire someone. And the Bible tells us in Romans chapter 15.5 that God is the one who gives encouragement. Aren't you thankful that this great God that we serve gives great encouragement to us? Praise the Lord. In Romans 15.5, depending on what translation, just the new living translation, it says God gives patience and encouragement. Some say God gives endurance and encouragement. And it says here that he gives us encouragement as we follow Jesus Christ, hallelujah. I thank God that he gives me encouragement as I follow Jesus Christ, his son. God gives us encouragement in many different ways. He gives us encouragement through his word. He gives us encouragement through his Holy Spirit. He gives us encouragement through his people, his holy people. Thank God that God gives us encouragement. Let me go back to that first one. God's word gives us encouragement. How many of you've ever been reading and praying God's word and meditating on God's word or you've just been going through a season in your life and God takes you to a place in his word. And when you read it, it's like the words just jump off alive to you. And God begins to encourage you and lift you up. How many of you have ever experienced that? I hope you have. That means you're reading your Bible 'cause the Bible is alive and God help us because the Word of God gives encouragement. I think about what the Psalmist would say. If you studied the Psalms many times, the Psalmist would be so discouraged and he would start out so low because of the battles in his life. And then he would say, I've looked to the law of the Lord. I have meditated on the Word of God. And all of a sudden when he transitions from looking to the law of God and studying the Word of God, the next thing you know, a testimony changes from discouragement. And the Psalmist says, I will put my hope in the Lord. I will put my hope in the Lord. How many of you have been so discouraged but you get in the Word of God? You get in the Word of God. And the next thing you know, your heart is encouraged. And you can say, I will put my hope in the Lord. Hallelujah. Praise God for his Word. Praise God for his Word. God's Word is encouraging. The promises of God are encouraging. The promise that God hears and answers prayer. The promise that God never leaves us nor forsakes us. The promise that God supplies all of our needs through the riches of his Son Christ Jesus. The promise of God that he has for us and not against us. The promise that nothing can ever separate us from the love of God. Hallelujah. When you begin to declare God's Word and promises, you will be encouraged. God gives us encouragement through his Word. That's why you need to be in the Word. As we see the day approaching, we need to be in the Word of God. God encourages us through his Word and God encourages us through his Holy Spirit. God's Spirit gives us encouragement. The Holy Spirit is referred to and known as the helper, the encourager. The Greek word there describes the Holy Spirit as periclete, which means someone who comes alongside to help or to encourage. Aren't you thankful for the Holy Spirit that comes up there? Listen, Jesus even said, it's better for me to go away so that the Holy Spirit can come, the helper can come, the encourager can come, the comforter can come, the strengthener can come. Jesus is better for me to go away so the Holy Spirit can come and help you. I love what Jesus said in John 1426. He says, but the helper, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name, He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. I thank God this morning that God gives us his Holy Spirit to encourage us. And I know many of you have sensed the Holy Spirit encouraging you. This past Thursday, everybody was anticipating the storms and the flooding and the rain and the winds. And by, you know, I was pretty much cooped up all day Wednesday in the house and trying to make sure our place was good. My mom's place was good. And then Thursday rolls around and they're saying that some of the, maybe the worst parts that morning coming through, there had already been some tornadoes in the area and I had to get out of the house. I mean, I had about all I could take. And I remember walking outside and I have a little barn behind my house with a lean two on it. And I just got up under that lean two and it had been raining. The wind was starting to pick back up. And I remember looking out toward facing North Carolina from my backyard. There's a big field out there and looking back toward facing and you could see the clouds dark and just kind of moving funny and the wind was blowing and you could see the rain coming. And, but here's what God did. Right there in that moment, you could see that there was a storm approaching. But God through his Holy Spirit, he began to flood my heart. And he flooded my heart with joy, unspeakable. I was there. I even told my wife when I said I was out there and I could see the storm coming. I could see it approaching. But the Holy Spirit began to feel me right there under that lean two outside. And I felt the joy of the Lord over me. There was a storm around me, but I won't flood it by the storm. I was flooded with the joy of the Lord right there in my backyard. And I thank God for the Holy Spirit that does that. He strengthened me. He strengthened me and many times just praying and praying in tongues. As Paul would declare there was an edification and encouragement coming as you pray. And those unknown tongues are heavenly language and God began to do that through me. And I praise the Lord for his Holy Spirit. God's Spirit encourages us and God's people encourage us. Let me take you back to this verse here. Hebrews 10, 25. Let me read it to you again. Pick up on this, the emphasis. Let us say us. Not give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing, but let us say us. Encourage one another and all the more as you see the day approaching. Let us, us is God's people. That's you, that's me. We are to encourage one another more than ever as the Bible says, as we see the day approaching. We are to be eager to encourage one another as we wait and watch for Jesus Christ to return back, to rapture his church and to set up his kingdom. We are to encourage one another. And we need encouragement because encouragement is powerful. We need encouragement because the battle with discouragement is real. I know many of us, probably each and every one of us have battled discouragement in our lives before. To the place where you feel like giving up or you felt like you've had about all you can take, 'cause that ever been your testimony before, I've had about all I can take. Or you felt like quitting, you felt hopeless, you felt joyless, you felt the heaviness of life being weighed down by life. That is discouragement. And discouragement, listen to me, I'm telling you something this morning because I want God to give you a breakthrough, but I want you to hear me because discouragement is real. And if you're walking through discouragement this morning, if you're battling discouragement, if you're trapped in discouragement, don't think that something is wrong with you. People go through discouragement and it can rip your life to pieces. It can rip your life to pieces physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually. Discouragement can set you back in life big time. Discouragement can take you to a dark place in life like the Psalmist said in one of the Psalms. My only friend right now is darkness. Discouragement can be dangerous. And people everywhere are walking around, fighting discouragement, battling discouragement. And here's what we do. I'm trying to, Lord, my prayer last night give people a breakthrough because you know what we're really good at? We're good at trying to hide it. We try to hide it. I heard the statement the other day from someone in the church. We fake it until we make it. We need to get past that. We try to cope with hoping no one will notice and we never like to admit that we are discouraged. So what we're really good at is we like to put on this life is good mask. But deep down inside there's this trap of discouragement. There's this fighting discouragement. There's this battle with discouragement and that's why we need to come to church and we need to be eager to encourage one another. Especially even more so as we see the day approaching. Fran, listen to me, I believe in revival. I believe in an awakening. I believe God is going to do it. But the world, the world, the systems of the world is gonna continue to deteriorate, get darker and darker, but in that the church comes together. We encourage one another and we're light to a dark world. Hallelujah. And that's what we need to do as a church. It happened in the early church. If you study Acts chapter four, you'll be introduced to a great man of God who was eager to encourage other believers and his name was Barnabas. But Barnabas was not his real name. In Acts 4, 36 you realize and you see that his name was Joseph of Cyprus. Now if my name was Joseph of Cyprus, I'd want the different name too. I'd want to be known as Barnabas. And the reason why Barnabas was his nickname is because as he flowed around in the church, among God's people, they began to nickname him Barnabas, which means the son of encouragement. The son of encouragement. Barnabas had a gift from God, a grace gift from God to encourage people. Did you know that encouragement is a gift from God? In Romans 12, verse six through eight, you'll see a whole list there of different gifts, grace gifts that God gives us. But one of those grace gifts that God gives us is the gift of encouragement. And it says here in Romans that we have different gifts according to the grace given to us. And here it is, verse eight. I'm just picking it out, but for time's sake. If it is encouraging, let him encourage. You have a gift of encouragement. And if it is, let him encourage. And Barnabas had a gift. He had this gift and he went around eager to encourage people with his mouth and with his motions. And that's what encouragers should do. We should go around encouraging people with our mouth and with our emotions. You remember how Barnabas encouraged Paul, the Apostle Paul after he was saved? The other disciples didn't want to have nothing to do with Paul because of his past. And I mean, rightly so. I mean, he was a persecutor of the church. He had helped to imprison Christians, murder Christians. And they didn't trust Paul. And they definitely didn't have no plans to encourage him, but not Barnabas. Barnabas, he saw the potential in Paul instead of looking at his past failures and his mistakes. He looked at Paul's potential. Isn't that a picture of God right there? Aren't you thankful that the Lord doesn't focus on our past and our mistakes and our failures? But God looks to our potential of what he can do in us, hallelujah. And that was Barnabas. He looked at Paul's life and he saw potential in him. He looked beyond the past and he looked to his potential. That's what encouragers do. Encouragers do that. We don't focus on somebody's past. Well, I know what so-and-so used to be and I know what so-and-so used to do. And you know, yesterday I had a memorial service we did here at the church from this Grace Bateman and some of that family I haven't seen in years, some of them I used to know a long time ago before BC. BC, Robert Smith, before Christ. And I met some of them here at the service yesterday and wanted the men come in to me. And he said, you know, my wife told me that you were a preacher and I couldn't believe it. I said, you're not the only one. I can't even believe it. He said, when his wife said that you are a preacher, I said preacher, what kind of preacher? A prison preacher? And I was thinking, you know what? That was in the past, but God saw my potential and God, hey. (congregation applauding) And when he was telling me this, he wasn't trying to be negative. He was giving God glory and praise too. And he, it was just an encouraging conversation. And that's what encouragers do. They look past, they look beyond the past and look out into the potential and they encourage people with their mouth. And think about Barnabas, think about Barnabas. Barnabas goes, if you study Barnabas's life, he goes from church to church with other believers and he encourages those people in the church. And the reason he does is because everybody needs encouragement. Hey, you're a Christian? I mean, it's not like you got a Superman logo on your chest. You're a Christian, you still need encouragement. Everybody needs encouragement. You need encouragement, I need encouragement. Everyone needs encouragement. Husbands and wives need encouragement. Parents and grandparents need encouragement. Sons and daughters need encouragement. Grandkids and great-grandkids need encouragement. Pastors need encouragement. Pastors' wives need encouragement. Pastors' children need encouragement. Every, I don't care who you are or what you do, there are gonna be times in your life that you need God to encourage you. So Lord, help us. And the reason why is because life is hard and life can be very disappointing at times. Life can be full of struggles. I go back to the psalmist and he said these about the struggles that were coming to him in his life. And he identified them almost like waves in the ocean. They just keep coming and coming and coming. Everyone wants to know, they'll be a little bit of a break, but then they come again, they come again. And that's how life is and that's why we need encouragement. That's why we need to encourage one another, keep growing and keep glowing for Jesus as we see the day approaching. I believe with all of my heart today and it could be even in this room right now that people are trapped by discouragement. The devil will use discouragement to trap you. I believe personally that in the spiritual warfare that we have, I believe that is probably one of his main weapons that he uses is discouragement. The devil will do everything he can to discourage you in your faith. The devil will do one thing to try to pull you back to your old life away from Jesus Christ. The devil will use discouragement as a weapon to cause you to give up and to give in and to go backwards. The devil will use discouragement to try to take you out and to trap you. And I want to just say to you friend, listen to me, let's be honest right now. There could be people right here in this room that are trapped with discouragement. People in your home that are wearing the life is good mask, but they're trapped by discouragement. Amen. Your friends that you know around you, life is good mask, but they're trapped on the inside with discouragement. People in your workplace trapped with discouragement. Oh my goodness, people in the community just trapped by discouragement. This past week, earlier in the week, I've had a gentleman come to our house that was doing a little bit of work for us and I had to meet him there that morning and he rolled in my driveway and, man, you could hear the radio going in there and I looked out the window and, you know, I just see people and I think, man, I shouldn't do this, but I'm thinking this guy just stepped out of the 70s, he probably just got out of Woodstock. And he gets out of the car and the radio's still blaring, he's got it on some kind of talk show thing and I walk out of door and he looks at me and says, "The government's crazy." (audience laughing) And I said, "Yeah, they are." And then he went on this thing, you could just hear the discouragement in his heart, man, he just went on and I said, "Hold on a minute, man. "Our hope is not in the government, our hope is in God. "He's gonna see us through this thing, hallelujah." (audience applauding) Yeah, you're right about that, you're right about that. People in our community are even trapped with discouragement because of the problems that we face today, look at the problems we face today. I mean, if you're keeping up with things going on in Israel right now, in the Middle East, there's the rumor that are out there, you know, the Bible says rumors of wars, that there's a threat now of World War III that's going on around us and then you look at the stock market that took a plunge and my goodness at the addictions that are killing families, financial problems, health problems, family problems, community problems, national problems, local problems, job problems, marriage problems, people problems, church problems. Oh my goodness, Lord, help us. The problems that we walk through, but thank God, thank God that in the midst of all that, God gives us encouragement through his word, through his Holy Spirit and through his people. Hallelujah, praise the Lord. Thank God, he puts people that somebody that will text you, somebody that will call you, somebody that will reach out to you, stand by you, show up in your life. How refreshing it is to have someone come near you when you are discouraged, someone to build you up with their words instead of break you down with their words. Can I just say this to you? Be somebody that builds people up with your words. Don't break them down. People are already beat down and broke down. They may have the life as good mask on, but I promise you, friend, just life is so hard and the struggles are so real. Build them up with your words and don't beat them down. Give people a hopeful word and a helpful word and not a hurting word. Beat somebody that inspires others to have courage and to stay true to Jesus Christ, even as we see the day approaching. This past week at camp meeting, on Tuesday night, I went to the altar, along with many others, seeking to have a fresh feeling of the Holy Spirit in my life. And while I was there praying, had my hands lifted up to the Lord, had my eyes closed, my heart focused in on just receiving from God. Our bishop, Bishop Beachum came up to me after praying for different ones and he laid his hands on me and he pulled me into closer to him and he whispered some words into my ear. I mean, he wasn't praying in an unknown language, I understood what he told me. He gave me a good word. He gave me a good word in my ear and he encouraged me and then he began to pray over me and he began to pray in tongues over me. And I mean, we were just both encouraged and edified in the Lord right there in that very spot. You see, encouragers will use their mouth and their emotions to encourage others. And that's what he did for me. Listen to what this scripture says in Proverbs 12, 25. Worry weighs a person down, but an encouraging word cheers a person up. Worry will pull you down, but a good word will lift you up. Ephesians 4, 29. Hello, listen to this one. This is to Christians now. Don't use foul or abusive language. Don't use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful so that your words will be what? And encouragement to those who hear them. You think you're encouraging somebody as a Christian if you're walking around cursing out of your mouth and you claim to be a Christian? That's not gonna be encouraging. Foul language, abusive language, hurtful language. No, let everything, let everything say everything. And if you can't say anything good, don't say anything out. I usually share that in my marriage counseling seminar sessions I have. If you can't say anything good, don't say anything at all. As we see the day approaching, God helps us to encourage people with our mouth, with our emotions, with our words and works. Pastor Caleb, if you wanna all come, I'm, I'm, it's amazing. I believe that clock is wrong, Noah. That clock is wrong. If the praise team would like to come home, let me just leave you with this thought here before they get here and we have some prayer time. Encouragers are like the Holy Spirit who come alongside of people and refresh them, who strengthen them, who help them. And so I wanna ask you this question right here. Please, please lean into me and think about what I'm saying here. Who can you come alongside of in giving encouragement to? Even when you're at church, God prompts somebody on your heart. Who can you come alongside of in giving encouragement to? Hey, sometimes you don't even have it to say anything. Just being here is encouraging. That's how it works for me is when you're here, that's encouraging. Hey, when that choir standing up here and I've seen it time and time again, some of them that are up there singing and knowing the battles that they're going through, I've seen people up there singing and I know that they have been going through chemo and radiation treatments and they're still in the choir and they got their hands up praising God. Listen, they don't have to come to me and encourage me. Just doing that right there encourages me that if God can help them through that season of their life, you know what, I'm not gonna complain. I'm gonna just say thank you Jesus for your faithfulness, for your goodness, for your glory. We need to encourage, who can you encourage? Who can you come alongside of and refresh? Don't tell me you can't thank you if anyone. Who can you come alongside of and strength and who can you come alongside of and give an encouraging word, a good word? Who can you inspire to have courage? Who can you give hope to? Who can you pray for? Who can you help me to need in their life? Who can you bless? And I'm gonna just tell you right now, man, there is a ton of people in this church that are gifted with encouragement. Because, I mean, I have, so many of you have encouraged me time and time again and encouraged our families and our staff and each other. But I want us to pray that God would make it, as we see the day approach and let us be people who refresh others. Don't you wanna refresh others? I don't want people running from me. I want them to say, hey, you know what, I see that brother coming. He's getting ready to refresh me, he encouraged me, helped me strengthen me. I'm gonna plant myself right here. What you gotta say to me today? Hey, here I am, I need some encouragement. And I wanna be a person that refreshes others, encourages others. I wanna be a Barnabas. You know what my prayer was last night? Lord, at my all the first Pentecost on his church, I pray that you would just gift those with encouragement and make us sons of encouragement and daughters of encouragement. I leave you with this because I was studying for this message and preparing, and I can't remember it was some great preacher from the past, and he made some commentary here on these passages and Hebrews, and here's what he said. It might have been a gentleman by the name of Wiersby. Warren Wiersby, maybe that was him. He says, here's what encouragers will do. I'll put it on the screen for you. Encouragers will bring blessings to others. We'll bring blessings to others. Encouragers will break barriers to others. Encouragers will build bridges for others, and encouragers will bear burdens for others. Man, I'd say Lord, as we see the day approaching, let that be the heart of the sons and daughters of this church. Let us be eager to encourage one another, encourage our children, our students, whoever. And then the Lord said, you know what? On this Sunday morning, there's some people in this church that are trapped with discouragement, and I want to set them free. I want to set them free this morning. And so I want you to do me a favor. I want you to stand with me right now. Okay, it's getting ready to get real hard right now. (soft music) Real hard. There's people here this morning that are trapped in discouragement, trapped in discouragement, fighting discouragement. But the problem is, is you've had that mask going so long that life is good. You can't be transparent and vulnerable enough for the Lord to be able to do anything in your life, because you're worried about what everybody else is thinking and what they're going to say. Man, I want you to be free from discouragement. The Lord wants you to be free from discouragement. And maybe you're here this morning and you've been going through a discouraging and disappointing season, or maybe you know somebody in your family right now and you know they're, listen, they're discouraged. However you want to do it, however you feel led to do, but I'm asking this, if you're here this morning and you know that you've been fighting discouragement, you know that somebody in your family has been fighting discouragement. A friend has been fighting discouragement. Your children have been fighting discouragement and you want them to be set free. You want the trap to be released and for them to be free. I want you to come down right now and just make a little place at the altar. Make a place where I can come and pray with you. God bless you, ma'am. God bless you, sir. God bless you. Just make a little way where I can walk in front of you, please. Just make a little way there and I want to just be able to pray over you. Just keep coming. I need anybody, our elders and deacons that believe in the power of prayer. I want you to come and just gather here behind them as well and let's begin to pray for one another. And while we do this, Pastor Caleb, if you just want to lead us in something, please don't leave. Can you do me a favor? If you're not discouraged this morning and God has given you victory over that, will you just extend your hand to those around the altar right now? Listen, some of these people are fighting for their life. Do you know how dangerous it is right now to be in a place where they are? Life ripped to pieces, discouraged, dangerous place. We need the Lord to set on free today. So let's pray right now in the name of Jesus. Hallelujah, hallelujah. You can turn me off, please. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) [MUSIC PLAYING]