Sunday A.M.
Faithful Commitment
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Show me the first Corinthians chapter four, first Corinthians chapter four, verse number two. I did not intend last Sunday to start a series, but I did, so we're gonna continue on this thought of commitment. And we're gonna continue again next week on this thought of commitment as well. But I want to look here in first Corinthians four and two for a text. We read here in first Corinthians chapter four, verse number two, this is Paul's first letter to the Corinthians. This is the midst of his word to this young church. This church was about four years old. And he wrote this and he's giving them instructions and giving them the faith, and talking about faith and talking about the temple and talking about all that it requires for them to do and some things that he was dealing with with them. He was talking about stewardship here in this particular chapter. And he says in verse two, he said, moreover it is required in stewards that a man be found faithful. Moreover it is required in stewards that a man be found faithful. Now last week we talked about the power of commitment. We talked about Hannah and her commitment to the Lord and her desire for a son, and she had that son, but Samuel, as we know, was the first prophet. Samuel, both Hannah and Samuel, they were both committed to God. They were committed to the temple, to the house of God. Why? Because they understood the concept of stewardship. What is the concept of stewardship that is this? It's that I possess much, but I own nothing because everything that I possess belongs to God. And in our text this morning, it reveals that it's required in stewards to be found faithful. You know what that takes? Commitment, commitment. And what I wanna preach to you this morning takes more than just commitment. It's faithful commitment. That's what I wanna preach this morning. Faithful commitment. When we realize this, that means that commitment is the function of faith. Commitment is the function of faith. Father God, I love you today. I thank you today for your word. Thankful for your presence. Thankful for a desire to do what you've called us to do and to be what you've called us to be. The examples that we were given in scripture, such as Hannah and Samuel. And throughout the word of God, great men and women of faith that were faithfully committed to the work of the Lord. As for your knowing to deliver this word today, pray that it'll fall upon not just listening ears, but hearts ready to receive the word. And we just thank you for what's gonna be accomplished through the preach word of God today. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen, you may be seated. I wanna back up just a little bit and read those first, a few verse here before and a few verses after our text. Paul says, let a man so account of us as of the ministers of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover, it is a required and stewards that a man be found faithful. He said, but with me, it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you or of a man's judgment. Yay, I judge not my own self, but I know nothing by myself yet. Am I not hereby justified, but he that judges me is the Lord. When we hear that word stewardship, we automatically think finances and money. But Paul is talking here about being stewards of ministry. He is talking about our responsibility in ministry and what it takes for you and I to be found faithful in that. And he said that when we're there, he said it's a small thing that people are going to judge us and that people's gonna have their opinions of us because it's not to please men, it's to serve men. It's not to get man's approval, but it's to minister unto them the word of God. And Paul understood that very well when he was called to what is this? It's called the function of ministry or the function of faith. And what is the function of faith for? What is the very purpose of the stewardship of ministry? What is the purpose of ministry at all? And so when we think about that, the function of faith is to lift up out of ruin. To lift up out of ruin, you hear that quite a bit? This morning, faith lifts up. Faith does not tear down. Faith is the substance of things hoped for. So it's building up, it's bringing up, it's lifting up. So faith lifts up out of time. It takes us from where we're at to have faith. He said that we want by faith, not by sight. So faith isn't a focus or a hyper focus, if you will, of the things that's going on around us. Faith is not based upon what I'm walking through, what I'm going through, what I'm facing. Faith takes us right out of where we're at and brings us into the heavenly realm. It takes us out of the earthly and brings us into the heavenly. Without faith is impossible to please God. Without faith, we don't recognize that I have a hope, which is an anchor for my soul. Without faith, we would think this is all that is is. But Paul said, if I had hope only in this life, I'd be a miserable man. Faith tells me this is not the way that it's going to always be. And faith tells me that I don't have to walk in the troubles and the trials and the persecutions alone that God is lifting me up. So faith lifts us from here into the heavenlies. In that very moment of repentance, the grace of faith came into our lives as the gift of God. That very moment of repentance, scripture tells us in Hebrews that he has dealt to each man, the measure of faith, or maybe it's enrollments, he writes that. And he has given each of us the measure of faith. That means center, saint, there's a measure of faith. But it's salvation. But it's salvation, that grace of faith becomes that gift of God, that growing faith. Here's how Paul puts it in Ephesians chapter two, verse eight. He said, for by grace are you saved through faith? I meant that, that faith, not of yourselves, it is a gift of God. So when faith came and we believed there was a new creation, right? If any man be in Christ, he's a new creation. So there became a new creation. We were lifted out of time. We were lifted out of ruin. The psalmist put it this way, he lifted me up also out of a horrible pit. Anybody was there? A marry clay, so we were lifted out of that clay, that quicksand, if you will, that we were sinking in. We were getting lower and lower and lower. Some of us were so far down that we had to look up to see the bottom. But faith, at that moment of salvation, it was faith that lifted us up out of that ruin. But he didn't just lift us up out of that ruin. But the psalmist said he placed my feet upon a rock. And who is the rock? It's Christ Jesus. He is the eternal one. He is who always was and always is and always will be in the beginning, what's the word? When heaven and earth passes away, it'll still be the word. There's one eternal one. And his name is Jesus. So faith brings us out of us into him. Faith brings us out of earth into the heavenly. It brings us back to that place that he intended us for to be. We were lifted out of time into eternity, into eternity. I saw this clip the other day. One man said that I am too heavenly to be any earthly good. Heavenly to be any earthly good. Another man said I'm too earthly to be any heavenly good. And all you know with all that, that's just the cop out. What we are is we are called to walk in the spirit and walk in the light that he is light. We've been lifted up. We were made to sit in heavenly places in Christ. And Paul says here in 1 Corinthians chapter four, he said I don't care what man's judgment is of that. 'Cause they didn't call me. They didn't choose me. He said that God has called me to sit with him in heavenly places and because someone has a critical judgment of my decision to do that, he said I can't change the stance because I desire to be in heavenly places. We were made to sit in heavenly places. The Old Testament shows that this is the function of faith and it shows us all the way through the Old Testament and even into the New Testament we find it. But there in the Old Testament we see that every time that God called for a commitment of faith, he brought a man out of where he was and put him in union with God in heaven. You don't have to look very far to find that. One of the first ones mentioned in the Bible is a man by the name of Abraham. All the kids are already going over to children's church but our young adults still in here may remember this, the children's church song. Father Abraham had many sons. I am one of them and so are you. So let's just praise the Lord. So Abraham is known as the father of what? The father of faith. If he is known as that example, why was that? Abraham is also known as the friend of God. And so we don't have to look very far to find Abraham. You can open up your Bible and just flip a few pages there in the book of Genesis and you'll find Abraham whose name was changed to Abraham. And then we find that God called him and he called Abraham and when he called Abraham, Abraham had to do something. When God calls us, we got to do something. We got to respond and we find that last week. Remember when God called young Samuel what was the instruction of the priest to him? Eli told him, you've got to answer. Just as you would answer me, you answer him. Abraham knew this, Abraham was called by God and when God called him, Abraham not only had to answer to call but he had to move. He had to come out from where he was and go to the place that God, though it's later, show him. God comes to Abraham in several accounts. One of those accounts he says, Abraham, I want you to leave the land of your father and go to a place that I will show you. So Abraham packs up everything, he's leaving. Abraham, where are you going? I don't know. Abraham, how long are you gonna be gone? Forever, I guess. I don't know. Why are you taking such a journey? Why do you have such uncertainty? He said, because God told me to go and I am going to go. And so Abraham steps out by faith and he steps out in faith and in another place. We know that Abraham and Sarah, they prayed for a son and then their old age, they had no son and God said, I'm gonna give you a son. We know Sarah laughed at it. Why? Probably good reason. He's there a hundred and she's there 90 and they're going to have a son. She laughed at the fault of that. Laughed at the fault of that. But what happened? They didn't get a son quick enough. So Sarah says, go into my hand mate and a son. That was problems. Then they held on to the promise of God. It says that Abraham staggered not at the promises of God. Then he had Isaac, Isaac's up in age. Once again, God speaks. He tells Abraham, Abraham, I want you to offer your son. Your only son, Isaac. Abraham didn't say, listen, Lord, I left my homeland and left everything I know to go to a place that I didn't know where I was going. Just kind of wondering out there, waiting on your, the GPS, the God instruction, given to me to wait and to turn. When you said turn, do what you're gonna do, but you're talking about a son that we've waited on. A son that we have fought for. A son that we have done everything. And now you're telling me to offer my son. I don't read any of that. Do you read any of that? If you do get rid of that Bible, you got the wrong one. But Abraham takes the very next thing we see is not Abraham saying, honey, we gotta talk, right? He didn't say, hey, Sarah, you know, Lord spoke to me this morning and tomorrow me and the boy and servants are gonna go over there on the hill and I'm gonna start cruising. Now, 'cause it was not Sarah's responsibility. It was not Isaac's responsibility. It wasn't the servants' responsibility. It was Abraham's responsibility to do what God called him to do. So we find that he gathered the boy. Gathered his servants. They hid for that mount. And Isaac's obviously been able to have some understanding. He said, Dad, Father, I see the wood. I see the fire. What's going on here? Where's the sacrifice? They had obviously done this before. Where's the sacrifice? And Abraham in his faithfulness and his faithful commitment to God. He continues walking. He maybe looks over his shoulder at his son and says, son, God will provide himself. God will provide himself the sacrifice. He will provide. One preacher put it this way. He says the promised child was coming up one side of the mountain. The provision was coming up the other side of the mountain. We know that that ram was there in the thicket. He did not offer his sons a sacrifice, but he was willing to do whatever God told him to do. Abraham had to come out of where he was. Abraham had to be committed to this walk by faith. Abraham had to do that. Faith is a function to regain heavenly ground. Every time there's a challenge of faith, it's always the same. And that is this. Am I going to stay committed to myself? Or am I going to be committed to God? Faith is the same. In our dispensation, it was in Abraham's dispensation. Faith has been the same throughout the dispensation of time. Faith changes not. Just like God, faith does not change. Faith is not like a suit that's fitted to the individual. Faith is faith. The word is the word. God is God. And none of that has changed. And so we see here that faith is the same and the function of faith is always the same. We go back before Abraham and you find another man by the name of Adam. In the beginning, we find Adam's name right after that. He's the first man. God placed Adam in that garden and what Adam faced in that garden? Two choices. Adam could choose God or he could choose himself. His choice, we know, am I going to commit to God? Or am I going to stay in myself? We know that he chose to stay in himself. What did that choice bring? A whole lot of problems. All the women say, amen. If you bore child, that came from that. He brought the whole human race into ruin. That's why Jesus had to come. That's why he had to come. Had Adam chosen God, faith would have changed him into the image of God's son. When Israel came to K-Barnaya, they stood there on the edge of the night. And where was this set that is on the edge of the Promised Land? 40 years of wandering. All of this time spent there. They're now there on the edge of entering into the Promised Land. And right as they stood before their Promised Land, they began but God had strung out these streamers of hope telling Israel that if they moved in faith, the land was theirs. They had a choice to make though. They would either retreat to the desert and save themselves or they'd be committed to fulfill God's purpose and to move forward and fulfill the promise of God. That seems to be a simple choice to God, but it does not seem to be simple to man. And here's the simple choice. Am I going to stay committed to myself? Or am I going to be committed to God? Same choice with Adam, Abraham, and pull anybody else out of the Bible that you want to. It's going to be the same thing. One of two things. Take anybody in this building. Same thing. Am I going to stay committed to myself? Or am I going to be committed to God? Meaning, am I going to do what I want to do? Or what God wants me to do? Am I going to be what God wants me to be? Or am I going to be what I want to be? Now, standing on this platform today is a man doing what God wants him to do because this is not what I wanted to do. It's not what I wanted to do, but what I did want to do was please the Lord, be in His will in every way. And I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world. Why? Because I'm doing what God has called me to do. Whatever you do, we do it as unto the Lord. Real faith does that. It's always the same. Real faith is being committed to what we believe until that which is real to God becomes real to us. If it's not, if what's real, what's real in this word, if you find yourself reading your word and you think, I don't know if that's true or not, we need to be more committed to faith. Because it's going to make it real. Oh, when this word becomes real to you, when that's not just some story. Oh, that's a good story about Abraham and Isaac. I don't really believe it happened. No, when it becomes real to you, when you realize that Adam was a real man, that Abraham was a real man, that Jesus became flesh, the word became flesh into what among us, Jesus was a real man. Josephus, the theolog, the scholar, the historian, he can walk you through these verses and he can take you into historic pictures of seeing this stuff. You can go over there and they're finding more and more and more in the places where it says that Jesus walked, let me hear a video the other day of this man, they were questioning him and his faith and his allegiance to Israel and all of those things. He said, I'm telling you that when I walk there, I walk where Jesus walked to know that that's a reality. I saw the place where they laid him and I saw that he is not there. He is risen. Why? Because in historical events, it really happened. There's no doubt about that and to realize that if it's real to him, it's real to us. The function of faith once again is to lift us up out of ruin. The function of faith demonstrated by faith in the Lord Jesus was what? What was the first message that Jesus choose to deliver in a public setting? He turned over to the book of Isaiah, didn't he? What did he say there? He read the prophecy of Isaiah, which is the prophecy of him. He said, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he's anointed me to preach the gospel. He said, preach a few times in there. He said, to set the captive free, to set the captive free. That was the faith. That was why Jesus, the man was here. That's why he came. He said, that's why the spirit of the Lord is upon me. That's what God is anointed me to do. That was what he said in that first public setting. Understand something when he comes on the scene. Have you ever been on a job and they brought in a new boss, man? The first thing they say sets the precedence, doesn't it? Or they bring in a new employee and you meet that new employer. Somebody, a department hit or whatever it is, we want to hear and what do they say? Well, automatically, he walks in the door, I don't like him. They haven't said nothing. Why do they all like him because we don't like change, right? That's it. We don't like change. It's nothing to do with that person. We just look at him. We begin to form opinions and judgments on, oh, he looks lazy or he looks like he's not going to work. How do you know? And then somebody will speak up and say, well, I want to hear what he's got to say, right? Same thing when Jesus came on the scene. He doesn't say anything. Only thing they've heard him say was, follow me, follow me. And so now they're following him and they're like, I don't know if I'm going to continue following him or not. Could it be to say, when in that temple that day that some of the disciples said, well, I don't know if I'm going to continue on with him or not. And the other said, let's just see what he's got to say. And so then he steps up and he says the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he's anointed me to preach the gospel. He's anointed me to set the captive free. He's anointed me to do all of these things. And now Jesus, the man, has set the precedence happening. He has set the vision in place. He has set ministry in motion. He has set the function of faith in motion. He is ultimately telling those that choose to follow him. If you follow me, this is what we're about. This is why God has brought us here. This is what he's talking about, the stewardship of ministry. Those who are called by my name. We can go back to it and we can claim it for ourselves. The spirit of the Lord is upon us because he's anointed us to be stewards. It is found of stewards that they are to be found faithful. And he said, this is what we're here for. That's the function of faith set the captive free. Bring restoration. His desires for you and I to be faithful enough to show the commitment to reach a lost in a dying world, to reach a strange people, to reach a people that are bound by drugs and alcohol. In our other sin, he has said that the spirit of the Lord is upon us. He's anointed us, not for our enjoyment, but for our employment. Stewards to be found faithfully committed, this is a desire for you and me to be faithful enough to show that commitment. Now we know in the natural world, there's a law called gravity and what is the law of gravity? What goes up must come down. And we on a daily basis constantly resist the pull of gravity, the same function, the same law, if you will, operates in the spiritual world and it's called something different, adaption. There's this constant pull, just like gravity, there's this constant pull. What is that pull? What does that pull that we're facing? Adaption. What does that mean? It's a conformity. Paul felt the need to write about it. Do not be conformed. He said, do not be adapted, do not be drawn in, do not be pulled in to that gravity. Computational pull of this world. Young people today realize that there is a call for adaption, right? There's a call and they call it equality and equity and all of these other things. And now it's called being woke. Woke. What does that mean? To be adapted to the world's system. Well, I read in my Bible that the world is one of the three enemies that's trying to destroy my spiritual life. Number one is that world's system. And we know that there's also another enemy that we are bound to every day. As Paul said in Romans 724, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Public enemy number one is ourself, is the flesh and the carnal nature. And there's this pull to be adapted to the world's system. There's a pull to be adapted to our emotions and our feelings and what we want and to go by what we think should be. So we're constantly having to resist that. There's a constant pull to make us a part of the cultural system. It's not just invading the world. It's invading the church today. It's invading, not slipping in, not easing in. You and I, we go somewhere and we're in the church for the first time on this way because I'm an introvert, we'll sit in the back, right? We just sit in the back. Devil doesn't do that. Devil does not do that. He comes straight to the front view and he can try to get on the platform if he can. Because he is wanting to infiltrate. He knows that he has got to be in that position to infiltrate. So there's that system that is invading the church and you know what happens? If we forsake the order, we'll adapt to that world system. If we forsake the order, there's always going to be an order called Middleburg Church of God because if we forsake the altar, we're going to adapt to the world. We're going to adapt to the world's systems. When we take out the order, we say we don't have time for prayer. When we take out the altar, we're just saying that there's a dictation I think that takes place when a man stands and talks for 30, 45 minutes and does not give you an opportunity to pray about it. He's not saying, "Thus say the Lord, He's saying, "Thus saith me." When I preach to you and I deliver you the Word of God, I'm inviting you to an altar to say unto the Lord, "Lord, help me to see where I need to make needed adjustments in my life," and according to what the man of God has preached today, and so there's an evasion of these things that's going to take us away from the altar. When we leave the altar, it's far down the road that we don't truly believe that God is. Have you ever felt that? You're just struggling with things and you get down to that altar and no sooner than you go from your knees to your feet, you realize God is with me. You're feeling that all we're saying, "God, where you're at?" And you get up out of that altar saying, "He'll never leave me, He'll never forsake me." There's power in commitment, there's power in prayer, there's power in God's Word, and there's power in His believers that will walk by faith and not by sight. The only way, the only way that we can get to that place, if we leave the altar, guess what? Faith does not leave the altar, it'll still be there. Faith will not leave us because we're a new creation. Maybe we haven't prayed like we should. Faith is still there, drawing us back to a time of prayer, but it becomes dormant. You ever put something in a glass of water and you don't stir it up and you don't shake it up? It mixes it first and then all of a sudden after a few minutes, or maybe you do shake it up, but you just leave it there and after a while you look, it's sitting on the bottom in it. If my Paul told Timothy, he said, "Let that gift be stirred up, and what is the gift?" When we were born again, what did we say earlier to that gift was salvation, that gift of salvation, faith, and that function of faith. And maybe it's there, but because you haven't stirred it up in an older prayer, you haven't stirred it up in worship, you find yourself just not being active in the stewardship of ministry and what happens then you find yourself being dormant. I always look at that word, "dormat" as like a doormat, and as doormat means everything and everybody steps on it. I am not the devil's doormat, you're not the devil's doormat, but when we do not put the function of faith to work in our life, we become as doormat, we become dormant, we become to that place that we're not active, that we're not doing anything, and in those moments, what do we lean to? Ourself, and what is ourself consisted of? Our emotions, our feelings, they're all up in their fields, they're all up in their emotions. And we begin to depend upon the very thing that God told us to crucify. The very thing that Paul said, "I died daily." When we neglect the altar, we find that we're there and that spiritual man is dormant and we've got to keep functioning, so what begins the function when our spiritual man is functioning? Listen, we've got to get up in the morning and we've got to go throughout our day, and if we're not being led by the Spirit, what does Scripture say? We'll be led by the flesh, and so that's what we find ourselves, that function of faith is dormant, but we're still functioning, that's a dangerous place to be. So we have to deal with that, and how do we deal with that? Jesus said, "These things come by nothing else but by prayer and fasting." Why? Well, we talked a little bit about this, the service of two ago, I believe Wednesday night we touched on it. God teaches in the fifth chapter of Isaiah that the fast that He has chosen and what it does, fasting does not affect God. We're not fasting to move God. God's the same yesterday, today and forever. We're not changing God's mind, changing His opinion, it does not affect Him in one Iota. Fasting does not affect the new creation, does not do anything to the new creation except to free it from the stranglehold of the flesh, but fasting is still our greatest weapon in this warfare between flesh and the Spirit. Why? Because fasting deals with the old man. Fasting deals with me, fasting deals with self. So when we fast, what happens when we fast? The moment, neutralist, what do you call him, nutritionist, it's a hard word like man aces, brother George would say, the people in the know will tell you that the moment you stop eating, you start dying. Just fast today man, prayer deals with that, fasting deals with that old man, prayer is dealing with the new man. So remember what I told you a few services ago, if you just go without eating for 24 hours, that's not fasting, that's starving, fasting and prayer together because while you're dealing with the old man with fasting, you're praying and you're dealing with the new man spiritually through prayer. So fast, we put down the old man, we're refusing to feed the old man, we weaken the old man, but when we pray, we lift up the new man until I, Paul says, it is no longer I, but Christ. Faith that has been dormant comes alive again. It's like taking that to settle, then you shake it up, or as Paul said to Timothy, it's stirring it up, it's stirring up that faith that has gone dormant. And when we do not fast to do this, what we fast for is not to stir God up. Some people get it wrong. Why are you fasting? I need God to stir up, no fasting is to stir us up. It's not to stir God up, it's not to make him realize he's supposed to do something. We're not fasting to get God's attention, we're fasting to put the flesh on notice, we're fasting not to position God in our circumstance, but to position us in the faith that we need to make it through our circumstance in a right relationship with God. So we allow unbelief to reduce a living faith to just mirror religious habits and formalities than we miss it, and the function of faith stops. But fasting breaks the flesh out of that, which is unbelief. And when we see that victory comes, anybody ever heard of Charles Finney? He's a great evangelist, one of the greatest of all time possibly. He made this statement of his own ministry. He said, "When I preach, the men are not affected by what I'm saying. I know what I'm now preaching out of, what I know, and not what I am." Here's his answer to this, he said in those moments, "I separate myself for a time of fasting and prayer, invariably when I come back it's not I, but it's Christ." What happened? Faith was released when a new creation is working, faith functions, changing men's lives, healing sick people, casting out demons, the neglect of the old or allows the flesh to be resurrected. There must be times of praying through. There must be a time to get to that place that believing that God is. As the scripture says, what He is, God is what He says He is. That's what His Word says He is. As His faith of God is released, there's something that happens in a very positive way in our lives, whatever it touches, it heals. Spirit of the Lord is upon me to heal, to save and deliver. So whatever, when that faith is released, whatever it touches, heals, it saves and it delivers. You look in the book of Ezekiel, that river of Ezekiel flowing out of the temple, he sees it there and the river never left the altar. He saw that river flowing from the heavenlies, from the house, across the threshold, into the streets, but it still had its source. It still had its source. That river of faith still has a source and it comes from that altar and that meeting place with God. And we understand that the altar deals with all that is not Christ. Wherever the river flows, as you read there, it produces trees along the banks. It brought forth a new fruit every month, the leaves of the trees were for the healing of the nations. It says, "What are trees, trees, or a symbol of us as people?" When allowed to flow, the river will produce spiritual trees whose leaves will heal the nations. The Spirit of God, the faith of God, the will of God, the word of God, all of them becomes synonymous. As you and I move out into a faithful commitment to God, we have to be faithful in our commitment to Him when the Spirit of God is flowing, faith is flowing, because faith is the fruit of and a gift of that Spirit. So if we allow anything to restrict the flow of God, or the clandestineness, they get upstream and blow up the dam because we need the Spirit to flow. We have to understand something about that river. I am not that river. You are not that river. We are the channel in which that river flows through. We are that vessel that God chooses to use. So if it restricts the flow of faith, it restricts the flow of the Spirit. If faith is restricted, the function of faith is restricted. When we lay hands on the sick and they do not cup recover, when we command the devil to come out and it does not come out, when we preach Christ and people are not saved, then something is restricting the flow of the Spirit. Consequently, there is a restriction in the flow of faith, which in turn means there is a restriction in the function of faith. Too many times, we do not want to deal with what that restricts, we want to complain. This is not happening. That is not happening. We have to deal with what is restricting the function of faith in our life. We have to deal with what is restricting 9 times out of 10, or 10 times out of 10. It is going to be because we have neglected that altar. It is because we got out of that altar and did not stay there in that altar. Until we deal with it, nothing is going to happen, so what do we do? We bring ourselves back to the altar. We bring our families back to that altar. We bring our church back to that altar. We bring our nation back to that altar. If we are going to see anything, it is going to be because we realize, if I got Jesus, I got it all. I have got Him. He is my everything. We bring ourselves back to that altar so that God, by His Spirit, can deal with those restrictions in our lives. The function of faith is not begging God to do. He said, "In Isaiah 58 and 8, then shall your light break forth as the morning." When the restrictions is removed and the river begins to flow, what happens? The revival that we have been seeking becomes reality. The breakthrough that you have been looking for happens. The things that you thought would never be. God said it, but we doubted it, right? God said, "This is going to happen." When it did not happen in our time, maybe we are like Abraham. Listen to Sermon, get that child of the bond servant, no, wait on God. Resist those temptations of the flesh. Resist in doing it our way. Resist. Well, I don't feel God, well, we don't go by feelings. The Word of God is clear. He'll never leave you. You say, God, where are you at? That don't matter, does it? What matters? What is more important? What we say in our times of our lowest point, listen, don't take advice from yourself when you're at your lowest point. One man said this, "Why are you listening to the devil? He don't even own the keys to his own house. Why would you listen to the devil? He'd back sleep before they were even a devil. Why would we listen to ourself and our lowest point?" We said, "Well, I don't think God moves that way anymore." What's the source? Is the source our opinion? Is the source our emotions? Is the source our feelings? I'm telling you, if I went by the way I felt times, I wouldn't be standing here today. You wouldn't be sitting here today because there's a real enemy doing whatever, the thief would come with Napa for the steal, kill, and destroy John 10-10. He said, "But I've come that they might have life and they might have it more abundantly. How do we find that life?" In his word, in his word. So maybe you're here this morning and you, that function of faith, that moving and doing and that flowing, you find that it's been restricted. You find that you feel dormant. Maybe you feel complacent. The flesh will tell you, "Well, God stopped moving in your life." The devil has no problem doing this. God can't use you because you did this. God won't use you because you did this. When did the devil become a pastor and a counselor? Right? When did he become our source? Don't let the devil teach you the Bible. He will twist it. Don't let your flesh, don't, maybe you're here this morning, if you're honest, you're all up in your fields. Come on, all up in your emotions. Brother Paul was talking about the show, "Who wants to be a millionaire this morning?" And they asked this question when they give the answer. That's your final answer. Well, what you're feeling and what you've been saying, the response that you've been giving to your current circumstance, I don't think God loves me anymore. I don't think God's forgotten about me. I don't think God can use me anymore. Let me ask you a question. That's your final answer. That's your final answer, because I'll go ahead and tell you, if I submit it, it's going to be wrong, because the final answer is you need to call a friend. Before you've got a lifeline, you've got to call a friend, I would use them before you make that your final ask you that, because I've seen people that says that the next step, when you say, "Yeah, that's my final answer," is walking away from God and backsliding. If that becomes your final answer, but what I'm here for this morning is to be that friend that you just phoned, whether you knew it or not. Maybe there's something saying, "Did you butt dial me?" Maybe you butt dialed me this morning. I don't know. But I've come to give you the answer, and that answer is found right here. God said, "I'll never leave you, I'll never forsake you, I'll be with you always, even unto the end." You've got a lifeline. You've got a lifeline this morning, friend, and to know that he is, he wants to revive that function of faith, he wants to revive that steward of ministry that you once were. You used to be on fire for God, you used to be on powerhouse for God. I think of Samson, you read to Samson all the things that he did, and now Samson is standing there in that arena with his eyes plugged out. He took and slew thousands of men with a jawbone of an ass. He defeated so many Philistines, nobody could touch that man. And now he's got a young child, a lad, they didn't send their strong men to get Samson. They said, "Hey kid, go get Samson." And they're leading him out there, and in that moment, Samson realizes something. I've lost my function of faith. I did not deal with the things that were hindering me and preventing me. I laid my head in the lap of the world. I did this, and I did that. He said, "There is something that has not changed through all of this. I only did those things when the Spirit of the Lord came upon me." So what did Samson do in those dying moments of his life? He said to that young lad, "Just put my hands on the pillars." The lad had no reason not to. He's like, "What's this dude going to do?" Because there was nothing in Samson that looked like anything would happen if he did that. But Samson called one more time. He said, "Lord, one more time, avenge me these eyes." He says, "Spirit, God rolls up in him." He pushed those pillars, and that house came down. He killed more in his death than he ever did in his life. Why? Because Samson realized what he did to neglect that function of faith. He took responsibility for it, and what did he do in that moment? He called upon the God that came upon him to do everything that he did, because Samson said, "I didn't do anything. I was just a steward of the ministry. I was faithful in what God called me to do, and when I quit being a faithful steward, this is where I ended up. We were here to get into that place when we refused to believe God." It says that Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him as righteousness. Now, we don't believe God is the reverse in closing this morning. Drop down to the next to the last verse of 1 Corinthians 4. Paul says this. This stuck out to me. I was listening to this verse as I was working the other day. Pulled up my Bible app, and I began to play 1 Corinthians chapter 4. I'm preaching on Sunday through the week. I'll get the whole chapter. I don't just pick the verse that I use for a text. I take that whole chapter, and sometimes I'll read the whole book, listen to the whole book, and I was listening to this chapter 4, and this stuck out to me, verse 20. He said, "For the kingdom of God is not in word. For the kingdom of God is not in word, but in power." What do we say about the function of faith is to heal, to save, and to deliver. When we flow the flesh and the things of the flesh to mix with the spiritual, we realize that there's a restriction of that flow of faith. Then we find because of that, the function of faith is limited. If we don't correct the wrong, what happens? The flow stops completely. So we say to the function of faith is, first statement we made is to lift out of the ruin, right? "It is you and me having the power of faithful commitment to do what God has called us to do." It's you and me having the power, he said, here, "For the kingdom of God is not in word, but in power." I read something this morning in a commentary that said, "The kingdom of God is not for the prayerlessness, it's not for those who neglect prayer. The kingdom of God is for the Abrahams, the kingdom of God is for the Isaacs, the kingdom of God is for the Daniels, the Shadrach, Meshach, and the Bendigo, kingdom of heaven. Those that are employed, if you will, in the kingdom of heaven are Paul, Peter, James, John, Wigglesworth, Finney, can your name be inserted there? We have the faith chapter that tells us all the great men of God and women of God. How they operated in the function of faith said, "By faith they committed, and by faith powerful things happened. The power of commitment is when faithful men and women are committed to not ourselves, but to God." Is you and me having the power of faithful commitment, it's not just words, it's not just talk, it's to do what God has called us to do. It comes down to this. What is your desire? What is your desire? What is your desire? Not your neighbor, not the person in front of you, not the person behind you, not your spouse, your parents, your children, or whoever may be here with you today. This is not a corporate question. This is a question that you have to ask of yourself spiritually. What is my desire? It's all to say, one thing, I desire to the Lord, that will I seek after. Is it your desire this morning to have the power of faithful commitment? Not just words, not just words, not just the talk, not just the title, but be men and women of faith that's committed. Same thing Adam had to deal with, Abraham had to deal with, and all throughout the Word of God through the entire dispensation of time. It has come to this room this morning to ask these questions, two choices. You have a choice. Two choices, actually. Will I stay in myself, will I stay in God's will, will I stay in what I want to do and continue to do what I want to do, or I do what God wants me to do. As I do prison ministry and jail ministry and juvenile ministry, there's always a question I ask, how many of you live life your way and they raise their hand. Every time they raise their hand, they're not, I guess they're not expecting what's coming next because I get them every time, so how that work out for you. How that work out for you, they're behind bars. Some of them, they're for a long time, they hang their head, not too well. Listen, lift up your head, lift up your head because all you got to do is give up your way and surrender to God's way. These bars don't mean anything. All this that surrounds you doesn't mean anything. Matthew 24, 25 unfolds the days that we're living in that says we don't have to worry and fret over this. We have an answer and it's two words. Look up. If I got Jesus, Sister Gilda Song, I got it all. You can't be full of yourself and be filled with Jesus, so let's decrease that he might increase how many would say Pastor, my desires to be faithfully committed to God. You answer that question not with words, but in power by putting those feet to action and meeting with me around these orders this morning, showing forth that desire I want to be committed. I want to be more committed than I've ever been. I want to be more faithful than I've ever been. I need to change. This flesh is telling me God don't care that God's not real and all kinds of other lies, but I can't believe that for a moment. If I got Jesus, if I got Jesus, I got it all. Will you come, find your place in this altar, commit yourself to faithful service and watch how God gives you the power to fulfill the work of the Kingdom of God. Heavenly Father. So we gather in these orders this morning, we come as a surrendered people committed to faithful service. I want to be faithful because your Word says that as a steward of the ministry, I am to be found that way. We want to stand upon your Word and the promises of your Word. Be everything you'd have us to be granted in these orders this morning. We ask in Jesus' name, amen. It's time for today's Lucky Land horoscope with Victoria Cash. Life's gotten mundane, so shake up the daily routine and be adventurous with a trip to Lucky Land. You know what they say. Your chance to win starts with a spin, so go to luckylandslots.com to play over a hundred social casino style games for free for your chance to redeem some serious prizes. Get lucky today at luckylandslots.com. No purchase necessary, VGW Group void prohibited by law, 18 plus, terms of condition supplied.