9-18-25 Study of Revelation Ephesians Chapter 5:18-21 Be Filled with the Holy Spirit Part 2

➡ In our Bible study, we’ve been focusing on Ephesians chapter 5, particularly verses 18 and 21, for five weeks. These verses emphasize the importance of being filled with the Holy Spirit, which is crucial for living a Christian life. This doesn’t mean just being saved, but continuously being filled with the Holy Spirit, which leads to spiritual growth and power. The key takeaway is that all believers should strive to be guided by the Holy Spirit, just like key figures in the New Testament, including Jesus Christ and John the Baptist.
➡ The text discusses the importance of being filled with the Holy Spirit in the Christian faith, as seen in the early church. It emphasizes that the power and influence of the early church came from their spiritual connection, not their methods. The text suggests that modern believers should focus less on replicating the early church’s actions and more on being filled with the Holy Spirit. This spiritual connection, it argues, is the key to living a powerful and impactful Christian life.
➡ This text emphasizes the importance of living in the present and focusing on being filled with the spirit. It suggests that God is not concerned with our future or past, but with our current state of obedience and submission to the spirit. The text also highlights the significance of gratitude, stating that a spirit-filled person is joyful, thankful, and serves others. Lastly, it suggests that being thankful, even in difficult times, is the highest form of worship.
➡ The text emphasizes the importance of gratitude in all circumstances, good or bad, as a way to honor and glorify God. It suggests that difficulties and trials are opportunities for growth and maturity, and we should be thankful for them. The text also highlights that being ungrateful is a sign of misunderstanding God’s intentions. Lastly, it encourages us to always be thankful, as this is God’s will for us.
➡ The text discusses the importance of faith and gratitude, both after a victory and in anticipation of one. It uses biblical stories, like Moses and the Israelites singing after their triumph and Jesus thanking God before Lazarus’ resurrection, to illustrate these points. The text encourages readers to have faith in God’s protection and victory, even in the face of uncertainty or fear, and to express gratitude in advance for the victories they believe will come.
➡ The text emphasizes the importance of gratitude in all situations, even during hardships. It uses biblical stories to illustrate the power of thanking God before, during, and after trials. The text suggests that being able to express gratitude during difficult times is a sign of spiritual maturity. It also highlights that humility is key to gratitude, as a humble person recognizes they don’t deserve anything and thus, appreciates everything they receive.
➡ The text emphasizes the importance of humility and gratitude in life, explaining that pride often leads to dissatisfaction and a lack of thankfulness. It suggests that understanding and appreciating the sacrifices made by Jesus Christ can help us be more grateful for everything in our lives, both good and bad. The text also highlights the importance of asking for forgiveness and being thankful for it. Lastly, it encourages us to always give thanks to God the Father, in all situations, and for all things.
➡ The speaker expresses gratitude for the men in her life and how their teachings have helped her improve her marriage. She discusses the power of gratitude and how it can replace negative emotions. She also talks about the importance of praising God, not just in worship, but also as a tool against adversities. Lastly, she emphasizes that individuals have control over their outcomes and that God responds to their actions.

Excuse me. All right, guys, welcome. This is our Thursday night Bible study in the book of Ephesians. We’re taking our time, as you well know. Some of you might be getting a little bored with the subject matter, but it’s full of. Of nuggets. So we’re going to again look at Ephesians chapter 5. We’re back into verses 18 and 21, where we have been for five weeks. And beginning in verse 18 of chapter 5, it says this. And be not drunk with wine in which is excess, but be filled with the spirit, speaking to yourselves in psalms HS and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, son, submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God.

Now that is jam packed with information. Now, I said we spent five weeks on this, but this is a tremendous text for you. It’s like your turning point. You might think that such a brief text could have been covered in less time than five weeks. That’s if we, if we added that time up collectively. We’re Almost, after tonight, 10 hours on these three verses. But the fact is that we haven’t even come close to exhausting this rich text. And I was debating whether to extend this for at least another three weeks or not, but I decided with what the Lord was telling me to do, to cut it off tonight.

So we’re going to move out of this text tonight into the remainder of chapter five next week. So the. The word of God is kind of like a limit as well. We, we. If you guys are doing your sanctification process, you should know that the harder you pump, the richer and clearer and fuller the flow becomes. What’s the flow? Knowledge. The more I study the Bible, the more inexhaustible it becomes to me. The deeper I dig, the wider the expanse of treasure that appears before my eyes. And it’s exhaustible. It’s one of the incredible experience of a ministry like this is teaching to continue to dig deeper and deeper and to find that the deeper you go, the bigger the subject becomes.

And that should be how it is in your sanctification. And you know, ignorance is bliss in a sense. You think you got it at first, and then the more you study it, the wider and wider it becomes. And so we haven’t even begun to exhaust the depth of the meaning that is here in this text, even though we spent five weeks in it. But the major truths of the passage is easy to identify with the Major truth of this brief passage is all our Christian living is about and the issue of living the Christian life, the walking, the worthy walk.

The whole idea of the Christians experience is based upon the concept that is identified in the scripture of being filled with the Holy Spirit. At the end of verse 18, you have the statement but be filled with the Holy Spirit or be being continuously kept filled with the Holy Spirit. And that becomes the heart of the issue in every Christian life. Now when you’re saved, as we talked about last time, you’re automatically filled with the Spirit. Christ comes and lives inside of you along with his Father and, and, and the Holy Spirit. You’re sealed, nothing come in and out.

You go through this traumatic change of becoming a new creature, new nature, all this stuff. But it is the, it is only the seed of your Christian life. It’s only you’re at the starting line. It is what you do and how you run. Like Paul says, I want to know, I want to finish the race. It’s how you run as it relates to being filled, continuously filled with the Holy Spirit as part of your sanctification process as whether or not you’re going to run a good race now only as we are filled with the Spirit of God.

That is as we are controlled by the Spirit, moved along by the Spirit. Think about what I’m saying here. You’re controlled by the Spirit. You’re moved along by the Spirit. You’ve yielded to the Spirit. The, the Spirit has directed you. Only as our lives are functioning in response to the Spirit of God, do we really know the power of God in our lives. You don’t have any power unless the Holy Spirit dwells inside of you. Is control, is controlling you, is directing you, is moving you along the path of where it wants you to go. Remember, you can’t do this by sitting on the couch.

You’ve got to move in the direction of what God is telling you to do and he will direct your path. You cannot experience the power of God or move in the will of God, or know the fulfillment and the blessing of God unless you are filled with His Spirit. In Galatians chapter 3, the apostle Paul said to the Galatians in verse 3 and you so foolish, having begun in the Spirit, just like we are saying, are you now made perfect in the flesh? In other words, you know you were born again of the Spirit. You know you were saved by the Spirit.

You know you entered into the body by the Spirit. Do you think that having begun in the Spirit, you could be perfected in your Flesh. The answer of that is of course not. But that is exactly where the majority of us live. We were redeemed by the Spirit of God. We were born again by the Spirit of God. We were implanted with an internal incorruptible seed by the Spirit of God. And Peter says, and having begun in the Spirit, we will be made perfect only in the Spirit. In other words, as we ascend the scale of maturity, that’s really what we’re talking about, guys.

As we scale the process of maturity, we grow only insofar as we’re filled with the Spirit. Did you get what I said? Your degree of life’s maturity in the Christian life is only insofar, meaning you’re only going to achieve that which you allow. As we’re filled with the Spirit, when we are not filled or controlled by the Spirit, we’re flattened out and there’s no progress at all. The growing times of our life and at the times when we are controlled by the whole, or at only at the time that we’re controlled by the Holy Spirit, then, only then does the flow of the power of God function within us.

You can be saved. You’re not going through sanctification. You’re not being filled with it. Continuously being filled with the Holy Spirit. You are not mature and you have no power. Now, every believer possesses the Spirit and needs at each moment in the in their life to be yielded to the Spirit of God. That’s the key of this entire passage, and that’s what I want you to walk away from after tonight. And we’ve been looking at that from various angles, degrees, all kinds of stuff over the last five weeks. And I just want to expand your understanding of that by pointing this again out to you, that all of the key leaders in the New Testament are characterized specifically as people filled with the Spirit.

Now, for example, it says of Jesus Christ himself in Luke, chapter 4, verse 1, and Jesus being full of the Spirit. And in John 3:34, it says what? God gave not the Spirit by measure unto him. In other words, he didn’t measure out some dose of the Spirit, but rather gave unto him the fullness of the Spirit. What’s that? That’s the continuous flow. Jesus even said the things that I do, I do by the power of the Spirit of God, which says that if you understand that you need to be like Christ, the only way you’re going to be like Christ is to do what he did.

And so the things that he did that you do can only be done by the power of The Holy Spirit, God, John the Baptist said, which was the forerunner of the Lord Jesus Christ, the greatest man who had ever lived up until the time of Christ. He said this in Luke 1. And he shall be filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother’s womb. What have we been talking about about biological birth? You are created in the process of a heavenly creation. You are filled with that spirit upon conception, that what is what creates the heartbeat.

And his mother Elizabeth and his father Zacharias, both of them were also filled with the Holy Spirit. Now, as we move along in the New Testament, which at some point we’ll get there, you’re going to find in Acts, chapter four that Peter the great apostle is filled with the Spirit of God. Why? Because that’s Pentecost, Okay? You get through that in Pentecost, he. When he became filled with the Spirit, he became bold and he became active. We know that he was filled with the Spirit along with everybody else on the day of Pentecost. But in chapter four, in verse eight, it specifically says this.

Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit said unto them, peter filled with the Spirit. Further, we move into chapter six of the book of Acts and we find the first officials selected for the other church. And it says of those individuals that were. That should be men full of what? The Holy Spirit. That’s where Stephen comes from. So in chapter five of that same. I mean chap. Verse five, in that same chapter, they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit. And then Philip and. And Pontius and Nar and Timon and her Parinus and Nicholas and a proselyte of Antonio.

In other words, those who were given to the leadership of the early church apart from the apostles, those who were to serve the people were those who were filled with the Holy Spirit. Now, how can you be part of the Church if you’re not doing that? How can you even claim to be part of the Church if that’s not happening? You’re a hypocrite. Stephen, of course, is one of them filled with the Spirit. Now, later on in chapter seven, verse 55, we’ve already gone over this when Stephen was being stoned. But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, looked up steadfastly at heaven.

And what did he see? Christ standing up, watching what was going on. Now, later on, we meet another wonderful individual who takes up particularly at the all the rest of the New Testament and a man named Saul, who became Paul. And to him, Ananas says that he would receive his sight. And in Acts 9, 17, be filled with the Holy Spirit. So the apostle Paul knew what it was to be filled with the Spirit. Acts 13:9. It says, Then Saul, who is called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, his eyes on him, and said, there was a wonderful man who was in the company of the apostle Paul, a man that we know as the one who was the comforter.

His name was Barnabas. And it is said of Barnabas in verse 24 of Acts 11, he was a righteous man and full of the Holy Spirit, you see, all the way from John the Baptist and Jesus and the Gospels to the people in the books of Acts, to those who became really the writers of the new New Testament. In part, the concept of the filling of the Holy Spirit of God is central to their life. There’s no way that an individual believer can function in the power of God apart from the control of the Holy Spirit.

You get what I just said? You cannot function with any power in this earth unless the you are controlled of the Spirit of God. And so this becomes the bottom line. This becomes the standard number one. Now we go back to the place where we yield the control of our lives to the. To the Spirit of God. And of course, what happened was people who were filled with the Spirit of God were able to function with such power that it was said of them, they have turned the world up upside down. Oh, wow. What? What did they do? We’re told in the Old Testament that the world is upside down.

Matter of fact, Jonathan Kleck went through a whole series in our substack to teach us what that meant. And now in the New Testament, when Christ comes, it says that they have now turned the world upside down because they now have the knowledge of the world. That’s exactly where you should be. The reality of yielding to the Spirit releases the divine power to enable us to do the things that only God can do. Oh, why is that important? Or to be like Christ? We’re to walk like Christ. We’re going to put on the armor of Christ.

We’re to think like God thinks. We’re to do all these things, and you can’t do it unless you have the divine power that God gives you through being filled with the Holy Spirit. If you’re ever going to do greater things than these, as Jesus said, if you’re ever going to know what it is to do, exceedingly, abundantly, above all, you can ask or think according to the power that works in here. You’re only going to know it as you are filled with the Holy Spirit. And we saw that that Means to be controlled by the spirit or yielded to his power.

That is, self has died, right? Old self has died, new self is taking shape. You’ve been regenerated. You got a new DNA. Everything is wired to heaven and not to hell. You, all of you have changed except one thing. You’re not continuously being filled with the Holy Spirit. Self will should have died. Sin is confessed and removed from your life and you’re obedient to the Spirit of God. You know, it always amazes me that people are on sort of a search to try to reproduce today in the early church. I guess this is part of what’s going on, especially in my lifetime.

Now I can’t speak a lot for generations before me, except what I learned from history, but immediately in the generation before, I’m not sure. And I’m talking about early on, right, that it was intense as it is today. But there has been, since I had begun studying all of this many years back, a tremendous effort to recapture the meaning of the early church. And I guess I’ve been a part of that effort myself in a lot of ways because I want to redefine how the early church did it. How did they do it in the book of Acts? Why? Because that was the church.

And if that’s what was supposed to be, you need to understand history. You can’t change what you don’t know. What were their methods? What were their functionings? How were they structured leadership wise? How did the LE respond? How did they work with people that they sent out to mission fields? How did they commission and contain and how did they work with discipline in the church? And how did they reach their world and how did they evangelize and how did they edify? Why is all that important? Because as the apostles went out to preach the gospel, they changed the government.

They removed all of the pagan gods and sent them to hell. We’ve already studied that. And they put in place God’s government. What do you think we need to do today? How do you think we’re going to be able to accomplish that if we don’t understand what the early church did? Now we were always after recapturing the Oriental church and we hear a lot about renewal of the church and the regeneration of the first century church. And you know, I think in many ways we’ve made it more complicated than it really is. You see, the key to reproducing the power of the early church is not the modus operandi of the early church.

It’s the same Holy Spirit who was in the early church, that’s all you see. We try to figure out this world and we try to figure out the things going on in this world in order so that we can make the change. But that’s not what your focus needs to be. And when the church in the 20th centuries is indwelled by the Spirit of God as it is, is, and when it becomes filled with the Spirit of God as God wants it to be, then it will be the 20th century church. Under the divine definition of the church.

It’s not a matter of recapturing methodology. It is a matter of being filled with the Spirit of God. Then we’ll turn the 20th century world upside down, just like they did in the early church. That’s what we’re missing. We’re missing in the body of Christ today, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit that controls our lives. Perhaps we should be less concerned with the academics or the recaptured church and more concerned with the inspiration of a spiritual life, because that is our bottom line. So Paul says in Ephesians, chapter 5, verse 18, being filled, being kept filled with the Spirit.

In other words, everything that I’ve said in the book of Ephesians and all of our studies, all your position in Christ in chapters 1, 2 and 3, all of your practice in chapters 4, 5 and 6, all of it involves what? Being filled with the Holy Spirit now, yeah, we learned about God’s plan. We learned about how we were born in this world. We learned all about that stuff. We had a great conversation, AI Tuesday night about how that takes place and how we’re so into the AI today and why does it fit in to what went on.

Because that’s how we’re born into this world. But the only condition that we need to be concerned about is being involved, involved with understanding and being continuously filled with the Holy Spirit, or nothing else can come to pass. Nothing really works out. Now, if you remember on the last four sessions, we’ve talked about a number of times in this text, that there’s the contrast, the command and the consequences. The contrast, as we’ve picked up in earlier parts of Ephesians as well, is the old versus the new. Don’t be drunk with wine, in which is an excess, okay, dissipation disease leading to death, but be filled with the spirit, old to them.

In other words, don’t do it like the pagans do it. Don’t try to introduce some kind of communion with pagan gods by drunkenness or any other. Drunkenness is not just about alcohol. Drunkenness is about what you focus your mind’s attention on in order to achieve the result that you think you can induce into your life. Now we commune with our God. Those of us who are continuously working on being filled with the spirit. We experience his power through the filling of that spirit. That’s the contrast. The command which is a command, not an if then statement.

Not oh, you may do, you should do this or you shall do this or you know you could do this. This is a command be being kept continuously filled with the spirit. It’s a continual thing. You know, this may shock you a little bit, but God is not interested in your future. Do you understand what I just told you? How many of you sit throughout the day and think about tomorrow or the next day or your five year plan or your ten year retirement plan or whatever. How many of you sit around and do that? Do you know what? God didn’t care? You hear what I’m saying? Do you know that in one sense you say, wait a minute, I’m big on the future, I’m big on prophecy and all of that stuff.

Well that’s fine. But you know what God is concerned about? God is not specifically concerned about your future. For this reason you’ll never live in it. Have you noticed that tomorrow becomes today? Tomorrow is tomorrow which you’ll never see. It becomes the next day. It’s, it is a present day environment. Are you getting this? Have you ever sat down and notice that you’ve never gotten to the future? Every time you talk you’re around to hear yourself. It’s true, you heard yourself. We like to think about what? The past, nostalgia, all furniture and stuff. We like to go backwards dressing like the twenties again and all that stuff.

We love the past. And then on the other hand we love the future. You know, the spaceships, the outer space things, the, the, the aliens, Star wars, all of that kind of stuff. Cre, weird creatures from Ray Bradbury and science fiction stuff. We love the future because the future we haven’t blown yet. Now we love the past because we can only remember the good. It’s the present we’re trying to get at, but we’re ne will never succeed. You’ve got to make it right at this present moment or the future does not matter. I guess that’s the way it is in life.

I’m quite sure it is. If you’re going to be filled with the spirit, it isn’t something you promise God you’re going to do. It’s something you are and you aren’t. It’s today it’s not in yesterday and it’s not tomorrow, it’s today. God is interested in your future commitments. And God is not interested in your future love. God is only interested in your yieldedness, obedience to the Spirit of God. Now, because this is the only time you’ll ever live it, you’re not gonna live it tomorrow. Tomorrow becomes today. You could only experience the Holy Spirit being continuously filled.

If you do it today, be being kept continually filled. That’s the command. Then the consequences were third. Remember and we said there were three categories of consequences. First to ourselves, second toward God and third, toward the others. Toward ourselves. Scripture says singing songs toward God saying thanks and toward others what submitting. And there was even a fourth. It was serving, by the way. We can talk about that if we have time at the end of this. But I want to get through this summer summation of these three verses so that you walk away absolutely knowing what, how and why.

Being continuously filled with the Holy Spirit is important. When you live a spirit filled life, the overall consequence is blessing. It’s compartmentalization. At first. There’s a personal consequence. Singing. And what is this saying to us? A spirit filled person has a heart filled with joy. We’ve talked about that now for four weeks. A spirit filled person’s heart literally overflows with song. That’s what happens inside of us. And it gets into all of the the details of that wonderful reality. Now the second category of consequence toward God, a spiritual person is rightly related to himself. Wow. He’s a whole healthy, together person.

You can’t get that from the world. From the time of your birth, you’re dying. You can’t be whole because you’re not whole with God at the time of birth. You can’t be healthy because you’ve got the spirit of demonic spirit living inside of you, controlled by the principality air. That’s not healthy. And lo and behold, you can’t beat a together person. Not only yourself, but with anybody else. Because you’re a total chaotic person. Just look at a three year old. I mean he can sing and rejoice and his heart is filled with song and it burst out of him.

Why? Because he’s controlled by the Holy Spirit and he loses all of those things that tear up human personality. He’s okay, he’s together, he’s got it made. He’s right with God and that means he’s right inside. Oh, that should be a self assessment. The only way you’re going to have outward visibility of being any part of wholeness. Togetherness is by what is in the inside of you. But there’s a second element and that’s toward God. There’s not only the tremendous sense of joy and right rightness with self, but a spirit filled person turns toward God. And inevitably the thing that happens is he says thanks.

Verse 20 for everything good or bad. Now we’ve talked about this and on many occasions I have challenged you. When not so good things come to you, you better give thanks. Because that’s what the scripture says. In all things, give thanks good. Or this is the second consequence. Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Oh wow. Many of you say, why don’t I just. Why can’t I just pray to God? Well, because that’s not what scripture tells me. Scripture says you have an intercessory. That’s Jesus Christ.

And scripture tells you that in everything you do praying to heaven, you must pray in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Listen, a spirit filled Christians conscious word filled means obedient, faithful Christian gives thanks to God for everything. We find in Psalms 100 it says, Enter into his gates with what? Thanksgiving? Because that’s the way you always enter God’s presence. Wow, Seth. You people who stay angry can’t get into the presence of God. You people who don’t understand you need to give thanks for everything can’t get into the presence of God because that’s the way you always enter his presence.

That’s the way you always enter God’s presence. With thanksgiving. Now William Hendrickson says it this way. When a person prays without thanksgiving, he has clipped the wings of prayer so that it cannot rise. We enter his gates with thanksgiving. We enter his courts with praise. Oh be thankful unto him and bless his name. Now listen guys. I believe that a spirit filled person is going to be one who says thanks to God for. For everything. Now let me give you something you maybe never thought of it this way. I’m convinced that the single greatest act of personal worship you can render to God is to be thankful.

That to me is the at a time of worship, not strand, not stained glass windows and organ music as nice as they might be, not setting in a church and singing great hymns. But the single most magnum magnamous, the highest and the best and the ultimate in worship is to have a thankful heart. That’s the key. Because thanks ultimately crucifies self. Thanks ultimately recognizes God as the source of everything. Thanks always is able to say in the midst of anything good or even difficult God be praised. God be praised. Thanks sees beyond the circumstances to the plan of God.

Oh, would you learn the plan, Jesus? 1, 2 and 3. I bet majority of you in your self assessments already forgot about that. See, it seems beyond the pain to the sovereign God. It sees like Romans 8:28 says. It sees that all things work together for the good to them that love God and are called according to he is purposeless. It sees the hand of God in everything, the good and the difficult. Is that what you do? Do you see the good in difficult time? Oh, many of you got to get off the high horse. You can do that once you get into difficult times or get angry.

You can’t even see the floor and see we need to have to understanding that thanks is the ultimate act of praise because it says this God, I thank you even for the hard times. I thank you even for those that die. I thank you even for a difficult marriage. I thank you even for a job that’s unfulfilling. I thank you for everything because I know that that it can be used for your good. And its intention can be to confirm me to Jesus Christ. That’s what Job said. Naked came, I enter this world naked child. And that’s okay because the Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away.

You owe nothing. You’re a steward over what he gives you. And if you don’t want to give it to you anymore, it’s gone. A lot of it. That has to do with your own action. Then what did he say? Blessed be the name of the Lord. I thank you God, when you g give and I thank you when you take. That’s maturity. That’s the definition of maturity. That’s a spirit filled person. In Second Corinthians, chapter 4, verse 15, Paul says this. For all things are for your sakes. In other words, everything that God does is for you.

Sometimes it’s a blessing and sometimes it’s a trial blessing and sometimes it’s difficult. But everything is for you. One everything’s done for what? To glorify God. That the abundant grace might, through the thanksgiving of many, rebound to the glory of God. In other words. Now watch this. The ultimate goal is the glory of God. We’ve already talked about that. That’s the reason why God created the spiritual beings in the first place, was to glorify, glorify his Son. The means to the glory of God is thanksgiving and everything give thanks. Good, bad, indifferent. It’s not yours to begin with, so why are you worried about it? The only thing you need to be worried about are the reason why you have difficult times.

Because you’re disobedient to God’s word that you need to worry about, because that’s sin. The means to thanksgiving are all things that God does in your life, good or bad. For all things, are for your sakes. That you might be thankful to God. So that he might what? Be glorified? You glorify God by being thankful. You say, well, God, this is to your glory, no matter how much it hurts, no matter what the pain or what the problem is. But later on chapter 2nd Corinthians, chapter 9, verse 11, it says, is being enriched in everything to all bountifulness.

Why? Why does God enrich us? Why is God bountiful to us? Why it causes through us thanksgiving to God. That’s one. I hope you’re tying the dots together. You see, the ultimate expression of response to what God has done is thanksgiving. If you’re a thankless person, you have completely missed the point. The whole of our Christian life is to finally come to the place of thanksgiving. Oh, my gosh. Sanctification. Understanding God, living like Christ. Christ was. Christ was beat, scorned. Not, you know, hit, died, crucified. And you’re worried about some difficult time. In verse 12, he even calls it abundant by many thanksgivings unto God.

And then he closes the chapter by saying this, thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift. Listen, God has done all that God has done that we might be thankful to him. Because when we thank God, that gives him glory, because it recognized him as the source and the sovereign of everything. And when you do that, you’re really giving him glory, because he is. And when you do that, you’re blessed. Now let’s look at the text again and see some questions that we can answer from this verse. What kind of thanksgiving is Paul after? First of all, when are we to be thankful? Verse 20 says giving thanks.

What’s the next word? Always. Winter. To be thankful. When are we to be thankful then? Always. You see, you don’t know my problem, and I don’t know your problem. But we’re still to say thanks always. You don’t know my wife, but still. Always. You don’t know my children. Still says always. You don’t know the lousy job I have. You don’t know the dirty deal I get. You don’t know what they did to me at that place. It does not matter what the scripture says. Always. Always, always, Always. Why? Because that is what recognizes that God is in control of your life and that God is trying to conform you to the image of Christ.

Christ. That’s what the Bible says. Put on the image of Christ, walk like Christ, think like the my God. How are you going to do that unless God take control of your life to do that with all things that occur and in all those things you read down to God’s glory and thanksgiving. And so it says. Watch this one, Thessalonians 5:18. It’s a great statement in everything. Give thanks for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. Now that is not a you shall or you should or whatever. That’s a command. If you don’t know what Christ’s will is, well try that for the starter.

Give thanks. Give thanks always. That’s the will of God that gives you a head start. Now if you go Back to Ephesians 5:17. Be not unwise but understanding what the will of the lord is. Verse 20 says give thanks always. It’s the same idea. God’s will is that we be what thankful. Shakespeare said, hell sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child in gratitude, thou marble hearted Finn. Even Shakespeare recognized what it is to have ingratitude. Now think about how if Shakespeare can do that which Shakespeare wasn’t Shakespeare by the way. That was just the ghostwriter, this ghost name for another writer.

By the way, think how God must feel when God brings difficulties into our lives. When God brings trials into our lives and we gripe and complain. Oh remember back in Numbers when God says quit complaining and those didn’t quit complaining just died off. Think about what your condition might be here. When God brings trials into our life and we gripe and complain and we don’t understand the meaning of James 1 which says this. When trials come into your life, count it all joy. Because out of that trial God is going to bring a perfection and a maturing.

You see we want to second guess God and we want to complain and we want to sort of quit grumble and all the Bible says and ask of us is to be thankful so that God can do what his perfect work. That is the will of God. Do you realize that maybe just the trouble that you’re, you’re, you’re get you have is to test you to be thankful. And once you thank God, it just goes away. Now there are three categories of thankful people. Now I want to see which one. I want you to see which one you fit into.

You give yourself this test. This ought to be on your self assessment anyway. Number One, this is the easy part. There are those who are thankful after the blessing. Give me what I want and then I’ll be thankful. You say I’m one of those. Well, that’s the easy part. Sure, after God has just blessed you, you’re thankful. Well, you know, I was ill and the Lord touched my body. Now I’m well and I’m so thankful. You know, we didn’t know what we were going to do. And then the Lord gave us a new home or, well, we lost a job and the Lord gave us.

After the blessing, there’s always the people thankful after the blessing. See, that’s the easy part. Now it’s biblical. No, look at Exodus, chapter 14. It’s all right. God expects you to be thankful after the blessing. It would be terrible. If you want, you remember that here are the children of Israel, and they count come to the Red Sea. And Moses lifts up his staff and goes like this over the Red Sea with his staff. And the waters part and they walk across. Pharaoh says, well, if they can do that, we can do that. Only they can do it.

Pharaoh marched the entire Egyptian army into the thing, and the walls closed down and drowned them all. Verse 28 of Exodus 14 says, the waters return covered the chariots and the horsemen and all the host of the Pharaoh that came into the sea after them, they remained not so much as one of them. Oh, by the way, did you know that deep water dies in the Red Sea? Archaeology is found chariot wills. Just as a historical reference. I find that interesting to me, since I’m a diver. But the children of Israel walked on dry land in the midst of the sea, and the waters were a wall unto them and their right side and on their left.

Now, thus the Lord saved Israel that day out of the hand of the Egyptians, and. And Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the seashore. The bodies were all washed up. Israel saw the great work which the Lord God did on the Egyptians, and the people feared the Lord and believed the Lord and his servant Moses. Oh, until they went to the Mount Sinai and when Moses didn’t come down, they didn’t believe him so much more. Right. Aaronville, the Golden Cat. So it’s only grateful for so long. You can ever extend it to a period of time that your thankfulness is really shown.

It’s just, oh, grateful at a point in time. Oh, thank you. Go away. And you know what they did? First of all, they had tremendous eternal joy. And so it says in verse one of chapter 15, they sang. Yeah, they sang Moses and the Children of Israel. And this was the song I will sing unto the Lord. For he has triumphed gloriously. The horse and his rider hath been thrown into the sea. The Lord is my strength and song, and he has become my salvation. He is my God. I will prepare him and habitation my Father’s God, and I will exalt him.

The Lord is a man of war. The Lord is his name. Pharaoh’s chariots and his host has he cast into the sea. And the song goes on and on and on and on, all the way down to verse 19 of chapter 15, the singing after the blessing. Oh, thank you, Lord. Thank you for what you’ve done. Verse 11. Who is like unto thee, o Lord, among the gods, who is the is like thee? Glorious in holiness, fearful in praise, doing wonders. Verse 18. The Lord shall reign forever and ever. Well, they only lasted so long. You see, this is thanks for after the blessing.

Now you’re going to find it in Revelations, chapter 15. It’s a wonderful picture. How the Lord counts in mighty judgment upon the earth that has been bathed in the bloodbath known as the Tribulation. And the seven plagues are spewed out on the earth. And there some people in verse two who get the victory over the beast. There will be some people that the Antichrist will not destroy. We’ll get to that when we get back to Revelation. And they sing the song of Moses. They sing the song of the Lamb. Great and marvelous are thy works, Lord Almighty God Just and true are the ways Though Christ of S.

Though King of saints. They sing after the victory is over and the battle is won, after the conquering has already been done. Now, guys, this is a time for giving thanks. There are always some victories, victories won. There are always some wars that have already been past. There are always some conquerings that have already been accomplished. There is always something which God has done. And we ought to say thanks after the blessing. But it’s easy then. That’s the easy part. Now let’s go to step two. Do you fit in this category? This is the ability to think ahead and give thanks before the battle begins for the victory that you know is going to come.

Oh, let me repeat that. Area number two. This is the ability to give thanks. Oh, you think what you’re thinking about is if I give thanks, I’m gonna win. Okay, let’s get really, you know, personal about this. You. You don’t have a clue whether you’re going to win or lose. You just want to give thanks so that you can Receive the protection. So the victory is going to be won. See, that’s the category that it is. First is after the fact. Second is anticipate anticipation of the fact. Now this is where the people of faith come in.

These are the people who believe God before anything happened. These are the people who are celebrating before the war. These are the people singing, Lord, I see a problem coming. How wonderful it is who you are. I’m going to believe you for victory in the midst of this, before it even gets here. Oh, my gosh, this is Jesus. This is Jesus in John, chapter 11 as he stands by the tomb of Lazarus. Everyone around him is crying, they’re all weeping. They said, he can’t move the stone. He’s been dead three days. He stinks. He’s already decaying.

Blah, blah. And he says, remove the stone. And Martha gets all upset about doing that. Verse 41. Then they took the stone from the place where the dead was laid. And Jesus lifted up his eyes into heaven and said, father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. Thank you, Lord, for what you are going to do. Now, that’s faith. It’s not going to guide with this anxiety of whether you’re going to win or lose. And say, God, I thank you. Because if I thank you, you’re going to bless me. And if you bless me, then I’m going to win.

You’ve already won through faith, guys. It’s understanding that that faith, through being filled with the Spirit, provides you the victory. And in order for you to understand that, you got to understand what being filled with the Holy Spirit is. And he says, lazarus, come forth. And he came out. It was bound in bandages, by the way. Another whole, another whole ravenhole we can go down. Because that’s where the term hip hop comes from. Comes from. Thanks in advance now, people, that’s another level of spiritual maturity. That’s the ability to say thanks before the thing ever unfolds.

Now, you might be one of those people who says, thanks in advance. You see something coming and you can believe God for the victory before it even arrives. Oh, my gosh, don’t even do that. Oh, I see it coming. I don’t know what I need to do. I, I, I, I, I really don’t know what stance I need to take here. I’m, I’m scared. I don’t know what’s going to happen to me. God, please protect me. Blah, blah, blah, blah. You have lost your faith. Are you one of those people who says thanks events? You see something coming and you can Believe God for the victory before it even arrives.

Can you say thanks like Jesus did in anticipation of death? Can you say, I see a death in my family, I see a death of someone I love. Thank you, Lord. Thank you. That I know what’s going to happen. He’s going to come through in resurrection life. Can you be thankful in the face of your own death? Now I’m going to give you another one. Look at this. It’s a fabulous story. It comes out of Second Corinthians, chapter 20. I mean, Second Chronicles, chapter 20. And that’s the Old Testament, chapter 20. This is really great. Now God’s people in or in Judah are about to have a war with a couple of real strong enemies.

Amen. And Moab, the Amorites and the Moabites. Now, if you recall, we studied this in the Old Testament in numbers, and they’re getting ready for a wholesale war here. But the king of Israel at this time is a pretty faithful man of prayer. What does he do? He goes to the Lord and he just tells the Lord all about it. He says, lord, this is going to be your battle. I mean, I just can’t handle this thing. We can’t do it on our own. He bowed before God and he pours out his heart and he says, lord, you’re going to have to do with these people just what you did when you drowned the Egyptians.

You’re going to have to do some wondrous miracle. You’re going to have to take care of this deal. Lord, I can’t handle this problem. I can see it coming, but I can’t handle it. And he got up and. And all done with his prayer, and he decided it’s time to thank the Lord. Wow. And somebody might have said, well, you’re pretty presumptuous there, aren’t you? Because we haven’t had the battle yet. Well, that’s how the majority of you think we’re going to prayer. Praise the Lord for what? First, for what? We’re going to praise the Lord first.

In fact, the first thing we’re going to do is in verse 20 of psychos, that and they rose early in the morning and went forth to the wilderness of Tekoa. And as they went forth, Jehoshaphat stood and said, hear me, O Judah, and ye inhabitants of Jerusalem, believe in the Lord your God. All right, let’s trust God from the very start. So shall you be established. Believe his prophet, so shall you prosper. What does it say? We’re going to believe God for a victory. We haven’t even seen yet. Here’s the first thing. And we he had consulted with the people.

He appointed singers to the Lord. You should praise what the beauty of his. Of his holiness. As they went out in front of the army. To say what? Praise the Lord for his mercy endureth forever. Listen. In Israel that day, the marines didn’t land first. The choir did. They came first because praise preceded the army. Do you see what I’m talking about? Lord, how marvelous you are. We’re going to win. I mean, can you imagine those guys who spent all of their life learning music? And when it gets ready for the big war, the first thing they hear is the choir fallout.

They’re in front. Incredible. That’s exactly what happened. And they began to sing. Maybe a little wobbly at first, but they got it going and they began to sing and praise. The Lord said, an ambush against the children of Ammon and Amen and Moab and the met at Mount Sarah, who were come against Judah. And they were submitted. They were taken out for the children of Amon and Moab stood up against the inhabitants of Mount Sarah utterly to step to slay and destroy them. And when they had made an end to of the inhabitants of Sarah, everyone helped to destroy another.

Want to know something? That’s Jonestown. They all killed each other. And when Judah came toward the watchtower in the wilderness that would be their camp, by the way they looked upon the multitude. And behold, they were dead bodies fallen to the earth and none escaped. They came upon a whole pile of dead bodies. And when Jehoshaphat and his people came to take away the spoil from them, they found among them in abundance both riches with the dead bodies and precious jewels which are stripped off for themselves more than they could carry away. And they were three days in gathering the spoils.

Significant times. It was so much. God has promised them the spoil of the land, and it was theirs by right. But don’t you see what happened? They didn’t even have to fight the war. They believed God and they gave God thanks before the battle even started. And the battle was theirs. Self assessment. Now here’s the hard one. You fit in this category. This is harder than after the fact. But God wants this too. He wants your thanksgiving before the battle even begins. And this is tough. This is the test of your spiritual maturity. When you crack up and fall apart in anticipation of the problem, then you haven’t reached this level yet.

Thank God after the blessing, that’s easy. Thank God before the battle begins, that’s a little harder. But the hardest of all is. This hardest of all is to thank God in the midst of the battle. When it looks like you’re losing, that’s tough. You can do it after the fact, very easy. You can do it in anticipation of. But can you do it right in the middle of it? Oh, you’re in the battle. You have this horrendous thing happening to you. You don’t even talk to your children. You don’t want anybody to talk to you. Your mind is so engulfed on the issue that you can’t even think.

The king set out a decree in the day of Daniel that nobody else should be worshiped or prayed to but him. Didn’t bother Daniel. It says In Daniel, chapter 6, verse 10, Daniel went into his room as his custom was, and threw open the doors as they always were open toward Jerusalem. And three times a day he bowed down and gave thanks unto the Lord. He’s God, and he knew what it would cost. And they took him and threw him in the lion’s den. But that was all right. He was going to give thanks to God in the midst of the trouble.

Now it says about Jonah, remember that story? Can you imagine if you were in Jonah’s situation? I mean, you hear it as the Bible story, but try to imagine what it would be like to be swallowed by a huge fish. Oh my God, the stench, the crap all around you. Floating around in the acid of his stomach. And worse than that, to be alive and awake, floating around in there. And Jonah in chapter two kind of gets his act together and this is what he says. It’s quite amazing. When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord and my prayer came unto thee, unto thy holy temple.

And what was your prayer, Jonah? I will offer the sacrifice unto thee with a voice of thanksgiving. I will pray that I have vowed salvation is of the Lord. Now here’s Jonah in the midst of an acid filled stomach of some giant monster of the sea, saying, thank you, Lord. He said, he’s stupid. No, who said thank you, Lord? You know something? God liked the prayer so much, he poked that big fish and it vomited out Jonah. And didn’t just vomit him out, involving him on the place he was supposed to be. Now here was a man who thank God in the midst of the belly of the great sea Monster.

Chapter 11. About all those people who thank God in the midst of those terrible tries. And then you hear the writer of Hebrews say, you haven’t had it so bad. You haven’t suffered unto the blood yet. Acts, Chapter 5 We learned in the early church is beginning terrible persecution. And it says in Acts 40 they took them and they beat them and they beat them. And after they had beaten them, they said, don’t preach anymore. And they went out of there and they thank God that they were counted worthy to suffer for his name. They were thankful right in the middle of the beatings.

And then you find Paul and silas in the 16th chapter of Acts, and their feet are stretched as far as they could be and looked in locked up in stocks and the muscles are taught and they’re in unbelievable pain. And what are they doing? They’re singing thanks and praise to God. Now you come to the Philippines. Chapter one. And the people are persecuting Paul when he was a prisoner. And he looks at the time when he’s going to die, and his heart is just, what, filled with thanksgiving. Listen, guys, it’s indicative of your character how you give thanks because you worship God in connection with what your heart.

And if the only time you can worship God and thank God is after the blessing, then you’re down on the first level. If, however, you can move a little bit higher and you can thank God before the battle even begins in anticipation of the victory he’s going to give you, hey, that’s better. But if you can give thanks to God in the midst of the pain, in the midst of the trial, then you’ve reached the level of spiritual maturity that very, very, very few Christians really. When do you give thanks? Always. For what? For what? Give thanks always.

For what? All things you say for all things you mean. For everything. Even stuff that’s troublesome and difficult? Absolutely. It says, count it all joy when you fall into diverse trials. Why? Because that’s the way God profects you. Now, I’m not going to give you a big long list here. I’m not going to take the time to do that. But the Bible has categorized those in which you could be thankful for a hundred different things within that category. Why? Because of declarations from God himself. We’re to be thankful for everything. There’s no limit to it, just the fullness of all things that God has done for us.

All of his attributes are listed in Scripture. All of the things he’s done is listed in Scripture. And we’re to be thankful for those things. Oh, you said I don’t even know what those are. Oh, well, you know what? You’re not being sanctified. Do you know the Bible tells us to be thankful for all men, for all people. It tells us to Be thankful for all things. To be thankful to God, for Christ, for salvation, for the Holy Spirit, for everything. We have to be thankful in the midst of difficulty as well in the midst of prosperity.

You are to be thankful for all things. Now need to be straight with you. There’s only one kind of person you can be thankful for everything, and that’s a humble person. You heard me right, A humble person. That which we Learned in Ephesians 4:1 as the first characteristic of being a follower of Christ, say, what do you mean by that? A humble person knows he doesn’t deserve anything. So the smallest thing to him is a cause of thanksgiving. If you have a problem in your life being thankful, the problem is not the lack of thanksgiving. The problem is your symptom of pridefulness.

You’re saying, God, I just can’t be thankful because I think I’m not getting what I deserve. Oh, wow, that comes out of your mouth a lot. But if you know you deserve nothing, you own nothing, you deserve nothing. You, you, you’re just a steward of what he gives you. And if he wants to take it away, he’s going to take it away. If you see yourself as a sinner who, for whom nothing is really deserved, then for anything that God would give you, there could be nothing but thanks. You got a pride problem. A thankful person always has a humble heart.

And by the way, humility is part of being filled with the Spirit. Because you’re only filled with the Spirit when you deny yourself. And you can’t deny yourself and have humility at the same time. When you die to self, when you crucify self, when you set self aside and you respond to the Spirit, it is an act of humility that makes you filled with the Spirit. You learned that in Ephesians 4. We’re looking at the ways that you have to walk with Christ. Basically, humble, with humility, pure, okay? In all things, it is an act of humility that makes you fill with the Spirit.

Therefore, it is an act of humility that causes thanksgiving, which proceeds from the filling of the Holy Spirit. Now we come right back to the first sin of all sins, which corrupts the whole system. And that is the sin of pride. That’s what Satan started it all with. That’s what Satan uses today, and that’s what Satan is going to use in the future. You know the game plan. We looked around heaven and he said, oh, huh. God shouldn’t have all of this. I should have a part of this. So he said, I will do this and I will Exalt myself and I will so forth, so forth and so on.

I, I, I, I, I. And even Eve in the garden, she knew that she could be like God. I always like that. Pride is the key to sin. So if you’re thankful, it isn’t really that you need to sort of stir up Thanksgiving, which many of you think it’s that you need to experience humility. And humility backs you up to the concept of being filled with the spirit. Because it’s only as you crucify self and deny self and yield to the spirit that humility can become a reality. If you’re a humble person, then you’ll be thankful for everything.

You won’t say, well, some people say my husband isn’t perfect. How did I get stuck with him? And the husband says, my wife doesn’t make it. She’s gosh, there must be other women in the world that people are really happy with. How did I ever get into this situation? People say, well, my job isn’t what it ought to be. They don’t treat me the way they ought to treat me. My family doesn’t treat me the way they ought to treat me. People don’t understand me. They’re unkind to me. And they get bitter, sour, gripey kind of approach to life.

And you know why? Because they think they deserve better. Boy, I should have a perfect person. I should have a perfect job. I should have everybody treat me as though I ought to be treated. It’s all pride. As long as you’re proud, you’ll never be thankful. And when you break the back of your pride and it grovels in the dirt, then you can experience what it is to be thankful for everything. So when you to be thankful always for what are you to be thankful for? All things. How? How are we to be thankful for all things? Well, look at verse 20.

Again, it says this. Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father. And here comes the kicker. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now that’s so fantastic, guys. It tells you what to do. It simply means in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ means consistent with who he is, consistent with what he has done. What did he do? He died for you. He paid the price for you. He gave you a host body system to go home. He gave you the free will exercise of deciding that. He gave you redemption. He gave you regeneration.

He’s giving you the glorified body upon death. What has he not done for you? In other words, no matter what happens to your eye, we can Give thanks because of who Christ is. What if I always said, you will not know who you are until you know who Christ is and and what he has done. No matter what happens in your life, it’ll turn out to be good and to his glory. That’s the fabulous truth of it all. Regardless of what you do, it’s still going to glorify His Son. But is it going to provide you with the fruits and rewards and blessedness? I couldn’t be thankful for everything if it weren’t for Christ.

But because of Christ, the good things and even the bad things in my life all have a part of conforming me to the image that God wants me to bear, which is the image of His Son. You see, I can’t just say give thanks for everything. Period. If you’re not a Christian and you’re not in Christ, you don’t have Christ interceding at the right hand of God the Father on your behalf. And you don’t have Christ indwelling in your life and you don’t have the sonship and the joint airship that he promised. If you don’t have that, then you can’t give thanks for everything.

Because what you’re going to get, you don’t need to be thankful for. Why? Because you’re going to get everything that’s inside of you. But on the other hand, if my life is in the control of Christ and I am His Son, which scripture says, and I am his child, which Scripture says, and I am a joint heir with him in his kingdom, which the scripture says, and if he intercedes for me at the right hand of the Father, which the Scripture says, and if he keeps on cleansing me from all sin, which the Scripture says, and he is conforming me to his image, which is what the scripture says, it’s all of that going on all the time, then I have cause to be thankful to God for everything.

You know, we’re by nature so self seeking because we think so highly of ourselves. And if we don’t get it the way we want to get it, then we get upset about it and we get unthankful. Well Christ wasn’t that way. If he. If it’s him giving thanks through us, it’ll be way his thanks was given. Do you know he was thankful to God? Matthew 11:25 he says, I thank thee, oh Father. John 6:11, I thank thee. John 6:23 I thank thee. John 11:41 I thank you. He was thankful all through his life. And you look at his life and you got to wonder why.

I mean, he who had everything in glory, right, came to this earth, right? And humbled himself, right? Because became a servant, right? It was spit on and scorned and despised and rejected and crucified. And he didn’t deserve any of it. And yet he was still thankful. Though he deserved glory, he got humility. Though he deserved love, he received hate. And though he deserved worship, he received rejection. Though he deserved praise, he got scorn. Though he deserved riches, he got poor. And though he deserved holiness, he received sin. And so it went. And in the middle of all of it, he never lost sight of being thankful and have thankfulness to God because he could see the end in you.

Oh now, self assessment here. We have already studied all of the things happening before the foundation of the world and know what the outcome is. But we’re sitting here in this physical realm experiencing that experience before the foundation of the world and we can’t even process it. Because he could see the end in view. It was the joy that was set before him that allowed him to endure the cross. And now look at us. We deserve humility and we receive glory. We deserve hate, but we receive divine love. We deserve rejection, but God gives us sonship.

We deserve scorn, but we receive affection. We deserve poverty and he gives us riches and we deserve sin’s curse. And he gives us what? His righteousness. I’m gonna end with this. According to the medieval legend, two angels were sent to earth. One had the task from the Lord of gathering together all the petitions and the other had the task of gathering the thanksgivings. The angel who went together the petitions couldn’t carry the load back. The angel that went to get the thanksgiving came back with a few in his hand. Well, that’s the legend and legends can be far fetched and fantastic.

But here’s the reality, I’m afraid that one’s not too far fetched at all. We’re so long on requests and not thanksgiving, which is like signing your name, your self indulgent servant John. And we’re very short on things. Maybe that’s the most common sin of all the saints. When do we give thanks? Always. For what do we give thanks? All things. How do we give thanks in Christ’s name? Finally, to whom do we give thanks? God the Father. Verse 20 Again unto God the Father. That ends this section on this scripture. Any questions, comments? Things you want to talk about, Sam? Well, even today, certain aspects of the army, they still sing and praise before they go out to battle.

Isn’t that a coincident The Marines do that constantly. Sickly all the time. The Marines do that constantly. David. Jim, some time ago during my prayers, I said to God, thank you for forgiveness of my sins. And I got this overwhelming feeling where I think it must have been God. He said, you haven’t asked for the forgiveness of your sins. You have to ask first and I will grant it. And so ever since then, I’ve always done that. Yeah, that’s a good, good picture. Don. I’m telling you, the men of this group are so phenomenal. I’ve been so touched.

David. That was such a sweet reveal. And Sam, when you talked about the women who helped you research, I was like, how do I put this? Your face, face looks so, like, proud. And I’m not used to your face looking proud when you give your insights. And then I realized you were proud of the women that you were working with and what they came up with. And I’m like, oh man, we’re so blessed with the men in this group. So I just want to take a moment and say, men, I just am so grateful. As a recovering feminist, I am so grateful for my, the men of God in my life, beyond words.

And Jim, tonight you probably transformed my marriage because I was thinking when Will does something that irritates me or I find like, you know, I’ve had that, I, I am that person who thinks I deserve more. And it was great because when you were speaking and you were talking about how when you have gratitude, you don’t have room for. And I thought, oh, if I could immediately go into, oh, thank, thank you, Will, and really mean it because I know I can. Because when I connect with God, all things are possible. I won’t be critical and I won’t be angry and I won’t need to remind myself, don’t go to bed on your anger.

I, I could shortcut the whole friggin thing that Satan wants me to participate in diluting the holy structure of marriage, which is, it’s so beautiful. It’s a way we can discover God. If both parties participate in how he structured it, we will know God in a real applicable way. So I just, I’m very grateful. Here I am. I’m very grateful, I’m very grateful for this tangible, applicable tool in my Christology Tool book now or toolbox now. I can, I can bring that out next time I’m. Oh, he treated me all, whatever, you know, that those, that stuff comes up for me.

I mean, Satan knows I’m a recovering feminist. I’m not a saint yet. So he knows that I, he can kind of poke at me that way. So I thank you so much for that. What else, guys? I’ll add something, Jim, to the praise. There’s. There’s two purposes. I’m just going to add an application. There’s two purposes to praise. One is we’re praising just because out of adoration and worshiping him. But there’s another purpose that you brought up tonight. Praise is a weapon of warfare and it’s in our toolbox. When the enemy was coming against the children of Israel, as you pointed out tonight, rather than fall apart, they turned to God and they started praising him.

Moses would send Miriam, who was the leader of the singers and dancers, the women. He would send her out in front of the army. And the. The present day application for us as a weapon of warfare, which it truly is, is when the enemy is coming against us for whatever reason it may be where everything seems like it’s falling apart. It may be you lost your job. It may be someone lied about you. I don’t know. You can think of a thousand scenarios. But at any rate, the enemy is coming against you. And our typical response is worry, just distraught, sometimes angry.

But that’s when the weapon of warfare comes in with praise. And if we will do as your example tonight, pick up that weapon and start praising the Lord rather than our being distraught. It totally confuses the enemy. And whatever the enemy has planned, it renders him powerless. So I just wanted to add that the weapon of warfare that you, you brought up tonight in scripture, that example, it’s. It’s very powerful and it changes the entire situation. Rather than our being on the. The defense and distraught and worried. No. We pick up our weapon of warfare and we start marching in offense.

And it absolutely confuses the enemy. I gotta ask a question. Why did the Israelites surround Jericho and for seven days they sang three trumpets? Do you ever think about that? Do you ever think about that? And what have we learned in the substack about energy? And what have we talked about? On Tuesday night we had to look up how to spell this. Grammar, words. Guys. The battle is for your taking, not for your surrender. And you control in the majority of the cases, your outcome. And it’s until you understand how to walk worthy of your calling and all of the facets of Ephesians 4, 5 and 6.

You’re not going to get there. I’m fix the stinks. Excuse me. So it’s important what we’re studying. It’s important that you begin to apply it. It’s important because it’s only. The battle is only going to get worse. And for whatever reasons, God positioned these classes at the right time with the right focus to get us ready. You need to get your tool. Tool belt on. You need to get your tool chest ready, and you need to define whatever it is that you need to deal with so that the outcome can be the outcome that God seeks for you.

You control it. He doesn’t. Do you hear what I said? You control it. He doesn’t. He responds to you. He’s not going to step in on your behalf. He’s going to respond to what you do. Anything else, guys, it just to add to that, it doesn’t mean the issue is going away. It just means that you will get victory. Yeah. Yeah. But that’s what you should out. That’s the outcome. You should see how you get there is going to be completely up to the positioning and, and all that stuff that God puts you in. But when we get into that point, you’re protected anyway.

So what is again, what does it matter to you? What matters is the end game. And if the end game is what you’re there for, then you need to prepare for the end game. Any other points? Hey, Jim. It’s always interesting. I. I had a friend of mine, many of you may know him, Zig Ziglar, and he always said that if somebody asks you, how are you doing or how’s your business or whatever, it’s unbelievable is what he always said. You go in with unbelievable, whether it’s good, bad, or whatever, that breaks down barriers. And then I had a minister that I played music with, worship ministry, and he always answered that same question is I’m blessed.

And that was always an encouragement to hear, I’m blessed. And no matter where you were at coming in, it just took you down a level. So knowing that. That he’s blessed. Yep. And Zig Ziglar is a great speaker. And if you’ve ever been to one of his events and if you ever place close attention to how he starts off the event, he puts everybody in the mindset that he needs at the very first words he chooses to use. That’s control. That’s power. Anything else, guys? Sure. All right, let’s pray. Father, thank you again for great evening of worship.

Getting in your word, understanding your scriptures, understanding the application into our lives. The, the. The way that you have laid this out, it could not be any more perfect. The only thing that we have to do is to want to receive that perfectness. Father, grant us the ability to understand, give us the wisdom to seek more understanding and give us the revelation to make sure that we can apply all of these things into our life. We ask that you continue to watch over us as you declare you do, so we can tell you thanks for that and understand that it is always going to happen.

You don’t have to ask for it. It is provided. So we thank you for that. We thank you for your son. Thank you for your son dying on the cross, the fact that he had to do that to give us the ability to go home. We, you know, I don’t know how much to thank you for that. That is the absolute minimum requirement for us to get home. And. And thank you for getting us into that place. Father, we ask you that you just watch over us throughout the rest of the week to next week as the world has shifted, as you have made it shift.

We ask for the continuation of the revival. We ask you for the continuation of the blessing on Charlie Kirk’s family and all those around him affected by his death, which is the complete world, by the way. And Father, we just want to give you the grace and praise of every sin in all of this, as this in all of your sons. Stand by.
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