Holy Spirit | Part 4

The spirit protects, corrects, and directs Woo. While the Bible directs, corrects, and protects. Woo. Yeah. See, I know some of you are just being polite because some of you are looking at that going, I think it just says the same thing.

All he did was change some words around. The spirit of God protects, corrects, and directs, while the Bible, all he did was flip it around, directs, corrects, and protects. Does everybody see that?

Does everybody see that I'm basically saying the spirit of God and the word of God do the same thing? Everybody get that? Amen. Alright. Sermon over. Let me just pray and we can go home then. We got it. Now I'm I'm joking. Don't leave. Because we need to get this more than just a surface level.

I get that all of us can read this and we go, oh, okay. The spirit of God protects us. The spirit of God corrects us. The spirit of God directs us. And yes, the word of God directs, corrects, and protects as well. I get that.

But but again, I hope and I pray that God can infuse this embed this deep, deep, deep within our soul, our hearts, and our minds so that we will once again fall in love with the word of God. So if you have your Bibles, open to Luke chapter four. It's a great story that we're gonna look at that teaches this truth. Luke chapter four, while you're opening there, let me just pray for us again that God would meet us in a special way right now. Spirit of God, do pray that you would just,

God, that you would just take these words and infuse

them deep within our hearts and souls and minds. Embed them deep within our hearts and souls and minds. God, make these not just words that we hear, not just another message that we hear, but God that this would become life for us, that we would leave here, all of us, me included, and have a renewed passion to begin to dig into your word, God. Would you do that for us right now, Jesus? We love you. Amen. Amen.

So in Luke chapter four, let me just give you the context. It's important that you get this. If you were to read the preceding chapter, you would find out that this Jesus that came two thousand years ago, that that up to this point in his life, no one really knew who he was.

He's been living about thirty years in obscurity in a little town, in a little village called Nazareth. There were only a few 100 people at that time in Nazareth, and all of them would have just known Jesus as the son of Joseph, or the son of Mary, the carpenter that works down that little street.

He had not done a miracle yet, he had not publicly proclaimed himself as the Messiah, So no one really knows about him yet. He's lived about thirty years that way.

But in chapter three of Luke, we find out that Jesus goes down to the Jordan River. His cousin, John the Baptizer, is baptizing people in the river. John looks up. He sees his cousin Jesus walking toward him. The spirit of God speaks through John, and John points to Jesus and says, behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. It's the first time that he would be announced publicly

as the long awaited Messiah. Jesus wades into the Jordan River, and they dunk him underwater. Jesus comes out of the water, imagine being there, and they hear a voice from the heavens saying, behold my son, in whom I am well pleased. And a dove representing the spirit of God comes down on Jesus.

Now look at Luke chapter four verse one. It starts off saying, then Jesus. What does that mean, then Jesus? That's why I just gave you all that background. Jesus has just been baptized. He's just been announced for the very first time publicly as the long awaited Messiah, then Jesus,

full, circle that word in your Bible, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan River, he was, circle this word, he was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. Now we're gonna circle back to that in a little bit. Verse one is very important.

He was full of the spirit, he was controlled by the spirit. That's what that means. He was controlled by the spirit and he was led by the spirit into the wilderness. Why? Why was he led by the spirit in the wilderness? Keep reading. Where he was tempted by the devil for how long? For forty days.

Watch what happens. For forty days, Jesus ate nothing all that time. How long? All that time. Forty days, all that time. For the entire forty days. I can hardly make it from breakfast to dinner. Forty days. This means Jesus is

physically exhausted and weak and tired, which means emotionally and spiritually, he's exhausted, weak and tired. Jesus ate nothing all that time and understatement, became very hungry. The way you should read that is became very hungry.

Now what we're gonna do, the next few verses actually describe when the devil will come and begin to tempt Jesus. We're not gonna unpack really the temptations today. What we're gonna unpack today is what Jesus does. Watch this. It's so amazing. K? Verse three.

Then the devil said to him, if you are the son of God, tell this stone to become a loaf of bread. But Jesus told him, no, the scriptures say, some translations say, Jesus said, no, it is written, people do not live by bread alone. So the devil tempts Jesus, and Jesus uses what to fight the devil?

Scripture, the word of God. He's in spiritual warfare, in hand to hand combat, he's in a sword fight with Satan and he's using the word of God. Don't miss that. Okay? Keep reading now, look at verse five, this is the second temptation.

Then the devil took him and took took him up and revealed to him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. I will give you the I will give you the glory of these kingdoms and authority over them, the devil said, because they are mine

to give to anyone I please, I will give it all to you if you will worship me. Now let me just pause there for a moment. As we're reading this, it should be peaking your interest because you should be coming up with some questions that I'm not actually even gonna answer today, like that. Wait, does the devil really have kingdoms of this world that he can offer up?

You you should be asking questions like that, and I'm not even gonna answer them. Go home and study it for yourself, but it's a great question. Verse eight though, watch what Jesus does. Jesus replied, the scriptures say, or it is written, you must worship the Lord your God and serve him only.

Jesus was tempted one time, and he uses what? Scripture, the word of God. He's tempted a second time, and he uses what?

Scripture, the word of God. Yeah. Okay. Watch what happens now. Verse nine. Then the devil took him to Jerusalem to the highest point of the temple and said, if you are the son of God, jump off. Verse 10, for the scriptures say, woah, hit the brakes. Who's quoting scripture now? Did did you get that? Satan, the devil,

is quoting scripture. Don't miss that. Jesus, tired and weak and hungry. 40 he's been fasting. The devil comes, tempts him. Jesus uses scripture. Devil tempts him a second time. Jesus uses scripture. The devil tempts him a third time and uses scripture. Oh. Oh, we have an enemy who is smart.

For the scriptures say, now the devil's quoting scripture, he will order his angels to protect and guard you and they will hold you up with their hands so you won't even hurt your foot on a stone. Jesus responded, the scriptures also say,

or it is also written, you must not test the Lord your God. He's tempted once, he uses scripture. He's tempted the second time, he uses scripture. He's tempted the third time by the devil using scripture, and Jesus uses scripture, The word of God. Okay,

now look at how the story finishes. Verse 13, when the devil had finished tempting Jesus, he left him until the next opportunity came. How many of you know that's exactly how the devil works with us, doesn't he? They're weak, I'll come after them. And if

you fight them off using this, he's gonna leave, but he's coming back someday, and he's gonna come back when you're weak and tired again, when there's a good opportunity.

It says he he left him until the next opportunity came, verse 14. Then Jesus returned to Galilee, listen closely to this, filled with the Holy Spirit's Power. What does it say? Power. Filled with the Holy Spirit's power. Reports about him spread quickly through the whole region.

One of my favorite preachers from even decades ago, he still preaches today, is Doctor. Tony Evans.

He's a black preacher from Texas, and I say he's a black preacher because you need to understand that he has a predominantly black church, and that will maybe help you understand the culture of his church. I don't know if you've ever on TV seen like, you know, when they'll show like a predominantly black church and how they're worshiping, or if you've ever been part of that. A couple of years ago, I had the privilege of preaching in a downtown

Phoenix, predominantly black church,

and it was so much fun because they don't just sit and look at you, they actually kinda talk to you while you're preaching. Like, yeah, love God, I heard it. Come on. Yeah, exactly. In fact, if you're struggling, someone will even say, help them, Jesus. Help them, Jesus. Right? They're with you. So so doctor Tony Evans, years ago, I heard him preaching this passage of scripture,

and he said something so poetic. After he finished talking about Luke four and what happened with Jesus in the desert, he said, if the living word needed the written word to defeat the enemy of the word, how much more do you and I need the word of God? Yeah.

But that was still a little disappointing on your reaction. So, so let's

just pretend. Let's play let's play church here for a second. Let's just pretend. I will act like Tony Evans. I'll try to act like Tony Evans if you will act like his church probably did. Can we do that? Is that a deal? Alright. So I'm gonna say it again how Tony Evans said it, and then you respond like his church probably responded. Let's have fun with this. Okay? So here's here's how here's how doctor Tony Evans

would say that. If the living word needed the written word to defeat the enemy of the word, how much more do you and I need the word of God? Oh, see now, isn't that fun? You need to start doing that at Rock Point. Isn't that fun? Oh, because there is so much truth in that, isn't there? If the living word Jesus

needed the written word, the word of God, to defeat the enemy of the word, Satan, how much more do you and I need the word of God in our life? And that's what we see in this story. In fact,

in fact, let me jump back. I told you we were gonna jump back to verse one. When I was studying this passage this week, I've read this story so many times, and I caught something this week that I'd never caught before. Look at verse one again. Can you put verse one back up on the screen? And look at this. Then Jesus

full, circle that word, full of the Holy Spirit returned from the Jordan River. He was led by the spirit in the wilderness. K? So Jesus is full of the spirit, he's controlled by the spirit, and he's led by the spirit into the wilderness. Now jump all the way to the end of the story

and look what it says. Look at verse 14. Then Jesus returned to Galilee filled with the Holy Spirit's Power. Did you notice the secrets of events?

Okay, let me review them. Remember the secrets of events. Jesus is full of the spirit, controlled by the spirit, he's led by the spirit in the wilderness. And in the wilderness, Satan comes after him. And he and he and three times, he'll come after him and every time Jesus uses what? The word of god, scripture.

And then after Jesus being filled, controlled by the spirit, and using the word of God, he comes out of the wilderness and what is very evident in his life, the spirit's power. Don't miss that sequence. You see there's something extraordinary that happens when you and I as Jesus followers,

combine these two things. See if you've put your faith and trust in Jesus, Romans eight:nine says it, you have the spirit of God. And when the spirit of God is working in and through you, and the word of God is working in and through you, you will experience the power of God working in and through you. That's what Jesus saw.

In fact, a couple of decades after this story, a guy named Paul who wrote most of the New Testament is writing a young leader in the early church. His name was Timothy.

And in two Timothy chapter three verse 16, he starts to tell us about this book that we have, the Bible, the word of God. It was the older testament at that time. But look what he says in second Timothy three verse 16. He says, all scripture how much? All.

How much? All. How much is all? It's all of it. It's everything. All scripture is inspired by God, is God breathed, is literally spoken by God, is from God. So here's what he's saying.

All of scripture comes from God. How much of scripture comes from God? All. How much of this comes from God? Everything. All of it. Everything. K? And watch what he keeps saying. All of it is inspired by God. It comes from God, and it's useful

to teach us what is true, to make us realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right. It directs, it corrects, and it protects. That's what the Bible does.

Now I'm making such a big deal about that all part and the part that it all comes from God. Literally, if God breathed, it says this, He's speaking those words to us, because I guess that most of you are like me, that at some point in your life,

when you were praying and you were struggling with a decision maybe, or struggling with a difficult thing in your life, you found yourself like me going, God, if you would just like write it out on the wall back there. Just write it for me, and then I would know.

Or Jesus, if you would just like you were two thousand years ago, just come down in person and stand in front of me and just speak to me. It'd be so much easier if you would just speak to me. Would you just speak to me? Would you just talk to me? How much of scripture is God breathed? You

see, when you and I open this up and read this, it's as if God were in that room with us speaking those words to us. Does that just give you goosebumps? You know why I use that illustration of like writing on the wall? Don't know why I'm looking at that wall, he could write on that wall too, okay?

You know why I'm using that? Because some of you remember, remember the story in Daniel where Belshazzar, the king, all of a sudden looks up and on the palace wall, the hand of God is writing a message?

And I've sometimes been like, God, would you do that for me? I don't want the message he gave Belshazzar because that message was your kingdom's gonna be overthrown and you're gonna die tonight. I don't want that message, but just write a message for me. And God's message to you and me this morning is I have. You're

holding it in your hands, but you take it for granted so often. See, there's something powerful that happens in our life when the spirit of God and the word of God begins to work in and through us together. Maybe I illustrate it this way. You'll see on the screen a picture. How many of you have seen one of these before?

K. That's that's a it's a a two person crosscut saw. How many handles are there? Two. Two. So it's to be used by

two people. K? Now I actually did find out when I was a little boy, I grew up in rural Montana. My dad had one of those, except it only had one handle or or or it had two handles on it, but it was as big as this. Let me put out one more picture just so you can see Put that next one up. Yeah. Look at this. This is how big those saws are. K? This is a bunch of sawyers or loggers in Oregon from obviously black and white long time ago. K? But that saw is to be used by two people. But my dad, I've shared this before, my dad was kind of a freak of nature. He was so powerful and strong. And so since I was too little to help him and my brother and sister were too little to help him, my dad would go out there and take one of those saws and I would watch him using a two man crosscut saw and he would cut logs with it.

You can do it, it's just not as effective and powerful as if two people were using it. Maybe on ESPN sometime, you've gone by and you've seen those logging competitions. I'm sure all of you are like, oh, I gotta record this. Logging competitions. Whoo. K?

But next time, maybe pause on it and watch when they do this, the two man crosscut saw competitions.

And you'll see two guys that have a massive log, and they'll get there, and they'll get ready, set, go. And when they go, you'll see them working in perfect tandem. Push, pull, push, pull, push, pull, push, pull. And that thing will go through the log like butter.

When two people are working together with the crosscut saw, it's effective and powerful. In the same way, you and I in our Christian life, we can walk in the spirit and that's powerful, we can walk in the word of God and that's powerful, but you put those two things together, woah, watch out.

Watch out when the spirit of God is working in and through us and the word of God is working in and through us, and we need them both. Years ago, I was a teacher and a coach in Montana, and there was a young man, he was in junior high and really, really rough background.

His dad had abused him and his mom terribly. In fact, his dad went to prison for a few years because he tried to kill his mom and got out of prison, fell off a ladder, died. This kid had just gone through a lot. He'd been in and out of detention homes. And so through junior high and high school, he would live with my family and I on and off, and we loved him, and he was he became like a big brother to my kids.

But by the time he got in high school, he got on a team, a sports team, and it was so important. He needed it. He needed to be surrounded by those young men. He needed those coaches in his life.

But I think they still do it this way in schools where every week he had to, like, teachers had to, like, turn in, like, did did they, is their grade point average good? Are they turning in their assignments? And if they aren't, you can't play in the sports.

Well, this young man had missed an assignment for me like a week or two weeks in a row, and so I told him, I'm like, I need that by Friday, you're or not gonna be able to play. So Friday comes, and I call him up to my desk, and I said, do you have the assignment? And he kinda sheepishly looks down, he's like, no, I didn't get it done, and I'm like, okay,

go go back to your desk. And he goes back to his desk, and I turn around and I start walking back to my desk, and I pray, and I say, God, tell me what to do. Spirit of God, show me what to do. Because see there's two biblical principles in here.

Most of you are probably thinking of one biblical principle, it's the one that we usually teach as parents as we should, and it's the Biblical principle, you reap what you sow, right? You didn't get it done, here's the consequences. And believe me, this young man had

been learning that in his life a lot. He'd been in and out of detention homes. That's a Biblical principle, and maybe that's what he needed to learn. There's another biblical principle though too, and it's called grace. And you and I are here worshiping and singing

and praising our God, because he is a God of Grace. And the reason that if you've put your faith and trust in this Jesus, you know that when you take your last breath on this earth, you are gonna spend an eternity in a place that no eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind can imagine.

And we're gonna be there forever and ever and ever and ever, and it's better than you can even it's the better than the best thing on this earth. And the reason that we'll be there is because God has shown us grace. You know what grace is? Grace is getting something that you don't deserve.

Grace is getting something that you don't earn. And the Bible tells us that God doesn't just dribble His grace out to us. In Ephesians, it says that He lavishes His grace on us. He he dumps out his grace. He gives us what we don't deserve. So on this day, with that young man, I didn't know.

I know I know from the I knew from reading the Bible that maybe he needed to learn, you reap what you sow, but I also know that maybe he needed to learn, he'd seen very little of that in his life, maybe he needed to be shown grace. I don't know, I don't know, and I'm walking back to my desk, who knew what he needed though?

The spirit of God. Now you're all wanting me to tell you what decision I came to, I'm not gonna tell you, you can guess as you drive home. The point of the story is this,

when we take the word of God, see it was these principles that were taught in the word of God that I knew this young man needed to hear, but then we combine it with the spirit of God, oh, it can be so powerful,

because I knew both principles he needed to learn, but he was only gonna learn one that day, and only the spirit of God knew which one he needed to learn. And so when I was walking back to my desk, I'm saying, God show me. God show me.

You see, here's the truth, the spirit of God will never ever ever ever contradict the word of God, and the word of God will never ever ever contradict the spirit of God, because the word of God was written by the spirit of God.

That's important for you to know because anybody who's been a pastor or in counseling has had someone that's come to them at some point, and they'll and I kid you not, we hear things like this, and you'll hear some,

some guy, for example, some guy will come and say, hey, my wife and I, we've just been struggling for a lot of years, and I know I got a family and everything, but there's this young woman at work, we're just, man, we connect, and there's just something spiritual between us, and I feel like God is No, no, no, let me stop you right there.

I know that God isn't encouraging that, because I've read this before. It doesn't say that. And the spirit of God will never ever ever ever ever contradict the word of God, and the word of God will never ever ever ever ever contradict the spirit of God, because the word of God is written by the spirit of God. Here's

two excuses though that I think we use on why we don't spend more time in this. And I'm saying we, please don't misunderstand me. I'm saying we, there's one finger pointing at you all and there's three pointing back at me. One the excuses we often use on why this thing collects dust on our bookshelves

is because we say, well, it's kinda boring. You know, I tried reading it before and it's just kinda boring to me. So let me answer that in two ways. First of all, you do a lot of things that you know are good for you that aren't always really exciting. Right? Like any of you that exercise

or eat healthy, you know long term it's good for you, but every single morning your alarm clock goes off, you don't sit up in bed going, woo hoo hoo, yeah, I get to work out today. No, sometimes your alarm clock goes off and you're like, oh, are you kidding me? But you'll drag yourself out of bed

even when you don't feel like it because you know long term that's gonna be healthy for you. I've been married for twenty nine years. We have a great marriage, my wife and I, yes. We have a great marriage, but anybody who's been married, you know this to be true.

I don't always feel like loving my wife, and she does not always feel like loving me, because sometimes I'm just a jerk. I just woke up on the wrong side of the bed and I'm not treating her nicely. But if God help them, Lord. I heard that. My

wife was here last service, so she would've would've said an amen after that one, trust me. But you know what we've done? The reason we're married after twenty nine years is we both realize that sometimes we have to love each other even when we don't feel like it because long term, that's gonna make a good marriage.

See, we do things that we don't necessarily feel like doing that maybe are boring to us sometimes, but we know they're gonna help us. And so to say I'm not gonna read this because it's boring to me sometimes, it's a little bit of a lame excuse. But let me use the flip side of that coin now too. This isn't boring. This

isn't boring. Now I get it, sometimes it will be. There's moments in that, I get that. I went to a dry season recently, I kinda had to force myself to be reading this. But but overall, this is not boring. If you will put yourself in the sandals of the feet of the people in the story, imagine that you're in the story.

Just take for the gospels, for example, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John that tell the story of Put yourself in their sandals, and when you're reading some of those stories, imagine what it was like. I mean, the disciples out on the boat that night on the Sea Of Galilee, there's this huge storm waves

going, they think they're gonna die. And all of a sudden they look out and they see a ghost walking on the water. Has to be a ghost because people don't walk on water. And all of a sudden the ghost starts talking to them and it's Jesus.

Jesus is walking on the water. Do you think it got back to the shore of the Sea Of Galilee, got out of their boat, ran into maybe a son or a daughter or a spouse? And they said, how was the night of fishing? Boring. No way. But we'll read that story and we go, put

yourself in their sandals and try to it'll make the Bible come alive for you. Can you imagine what it was like if you were standing there that day that Lazarus, the friend of Jesus died and they go down to the grave and everybody's crying and weeping, and all of sudden Jesus says, Lazarus, come out. Imagine

if you were in the sandals of some of those people there and you're going,

like what is gonna happen? There was that moment where everyone there is like, is he crazy? What's gonna happen? And imagine what it was like when all of sudden, Lazarus comes waddling out in his grave clothes, right?

Would you have gone home and I mean, imagine if I'm doing a funeral here at Rock Point, k? And it's an open casket funeral, and right here in front of me, and we'll we'll call him Bill, okay? So Bill,

so Bill, and you guys are all crying and you're weeping because Bill is, and it's an open casket of funerals there, and I've been preaching this eulogy talking about what a great guy Bill is, and everybody's crying. And all of a sudden I just stop and I say, Bill, get up.

Can you imagine in here, everyone in here is going like, you're standing up in the back row. And what if Bill sat up? No one would go get in their cars or pulling out of the parking lot going, yeah, the funeral was okay.

But then we read about it in the Bible and we go, Yeah, it's kinda boring. What? The book of Esther, I just started a midweek Bible study and I'm teaching you the book of Esther. I don't know if you've ever read through Esther or if it's been a long time since you've read through Esther, but that is an unbelievable

story. It's 10 chapters full of murder and intrigue and good guys and bad guys and good leadership and bad leaderships and kings and queens and and and irony. Oh, the irony and the humor and genocide.

I mean, it's an amazing story. 10 chapters, it'll take you twenty to thirty minutes to read it. And at the end of every chapter, you're gonna be it's almost like a cliffhanger. It's an amazing story, and it's in here. So sadly, of the excuses we'll use sometimes is say, well, it's boring. Well, read it differently.

It'll come alive if you put yourself on the sandals of the people that are there and if you say, God, would you teach me from what I'm gonna read today? Here's another excuse that we often use is we'll say, well, don't know if I can really trust it. I mean, I don't know if I can really trust this.

And I say that's okay to be a skeptic, just be a consistent skeptic. As Rabbi Zachariah says, be skeptical of your skepticism.

So this Thanksgiving, when you go to your Thanksgiving meal and uncle Joe is there, uncle Joe who's really anti religious, anti Bible, anti God, and really boisterous about it. He goes, yeah, that Bible stuff, that's just a bunch of garbage.

I mean, how can you trust it? I mean, how do you know if it's not just made up myths and legends? That's okay. In a very loving, loving did you hear me say that loving? Lovingly respond to Uncle Joe and ask Uncle Joe to be a consistent skeptic. Say, it's okay. You're saying that you think it's myths and legends.

What myths and legends exactly are you talking about? Because you know, most people that say that have actually never read it.

But let me just back up though and go, you and I sometimes, you and I sometimes, when we're all alone and no one else is with us, and we're not putting it on a show for other Jesus following friends, I've been there, taking a hike, and all of a sudden I go, what if we're wrong?

I mean I'm staking my life on this. I'm staking my eternity on this. I mean, the Muslims and the Mormons and the Jehovah's Witnesses, they believe more passionately than I do sometimes. What if they're right and I'm wrong? So let me just speak into that because I know you've probably felt that before and it's okay.

First of all, you need to understand that there's been no book in the history of humanity that has been critiqued more than this. And there is no book in the history of humanity

that sits on a mountain of evidence, textual and historical evidence, than the Bible. Nothing else has been questioned more, nothing more has been critiqued more, and yet it still stands on a mountain of textual evidence and historical evidence that this is true. Every time they start digging a hole over in Israel, they find something else that proves this to be true. Every

time. I had a friend that just went over last summer, and he was doing a dig right outside of Jerusalem. They've been they've been bombing, burning,

destroying that city, digging it up for thousands of years. And there's a guy that's mentioned in second Kings, and he was an official, and he's not mentioned anywhere else in history. And it was one of the places that the critics of the Bible for years were saying, well, see, there's another place the Bible's wrong. They may just made up some guy. Well, guess what? Just last summer, they're digging a hole, and they find a coin with his name on it.

We keep getting more and more evidence that proves that this is true. But even beyond that, God knew that you and I would struggle just like they did long ago and question, is this real? Is God real? Is this real? Twenty seven hundred years ago,

through the prophet Isaiah, he comes to his people at that time and he says, so that you will know that I am God, I'm gonna tell you what's gonna happen in the future, and then I'm gonna make it happen. There's no other God that can do that, small g. I

will tell you over and over and over again what's gonna happen in the future, and then I'll make it happen. It's called prophecy. There's 2,700 prophecies approximately in the Bible. To date, 2,500 of those have been fulfilled. Wow, clap on that. Wow. That means 2,500 times,

sometimes hundreds of years before it even happens, God to a prophet will say, this is what's gonna happen, this is when it's gonna happen, this is how it's gonna happen, and historically 2,500 times, we can look from history and say, yep, it happened exactly like God said it was gonna happen. Only God can do that.

And so this right here, it's a beautiful book, 40 different authors over fifteen hundred years. There's poetry in it, there's songs in it, there's history in it. But it's not just another piece of literature, it's God's Word to you and me. It's as if God were speaking to you and me. Oh, we wouldn't take that for granted.

I wanna challenge you. It's a challenge for me too.

For the next thirty days, would you just commit that for thirty days, you're gonna carve out time in your day to spend a little bit of time in here. Maybe you're gonna read I don't know. You can go wherever you want. Proverbs is a great place. Just whatever day of the month it is, read that proverb. I've read that book probably a 100 plus times in my life. I love that. It's wisdom. It basically tells us how to live life. On the eighteenth day of the month, read chapter 18. On the tenth day of month, read chapter 10. Maybe you wanna read the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John, the story about Jesus when he was here on earth. Maybe you wanna read Esther. I was just talking about Esther. But would you just commit for the next thirty days,

every day, would you carve out some time and read this? And when you read it, would you put yourself in their sandals and would you say, God, would you teach me from your word today? Would you make this come alive for me today? If you do that for thirty days, because we just saw in Luke chapter four,

when the spirit of God and the word of God together working in and through us, that's when we will experience the power of God. Let me just close with this story. And I hope it does for you what it did for me when I read this.

It's about a man who was in a communist country, a regime that was trying to stamp out Christianity. And so he was thrown in prison because of his love for God, and would spend fourteen years in a prison camp, tortured, just

untold things done to him, unspeakable things done to him. And they kept telling him, all you have to do is deny Christ and you can walk out the gate. At one point, he had not seen or read or touched the Bible for three years. For three years.

And he goes in, one of his job is to clean out the latrines, and since it's a communist country, they don't have very good plumbing,

And so they would take the stuff that they wiped with and just throw it in a waste paper basket. So he's in there cleaning out this waste paper basket, and all of a sudden he sees in this crumpled piece the word Romans. It's one of the books we have in here.

And he sees Romans and and when he sees it, there's tears that start to come down his face because he he hasn't seen or read or touched the Bible for three years.

And he sees those and he begins to cry and he pulls this crumpled piece of Romans, finds out that the guards had been taking a Bible that they had confiscated and tearing pages out and using it as toilet paper, and it's smeared with feces.

And through his tear stained eyes, he tries to clean the feces off the best he can. And then he looks at these words written on this page, the word of God to him. And he begins to weep over these.

And he stands up and he takes that and he folds it up very carefully and he hides it in his clothes and he takes it back to his cell. And over the next days and weeks, he memorizes word for word that. And then he hands it off to other prisoners. I hear that story and I

think to myself and I'm talking to myself as much as I'm talking to you, how often this sits on a shelf at my home and I don't think anything of it. In fact, have half a dozen of these sitting at home. And I wonder what would happen to us if all of a sudden for three years,

for three years you didn't get to come and hear a message about this. You couldn't read this, you couldn't touch this, you couldn't hold this. And may we not take this for granted. Rock Point, I encourage you to take this challenge and let God help you fall in love with his word again,

and you will see the power of God in your life like you will not believe, if you allow the spirit of God and the word of God to work in and through you together. Jesus, may we get this. Oh, spirit of God, may we get this.

May this not just become another book to us, God, but in these next thirty days, as we take this challenge, God, would you do something extraordinary in our life? Would you open our eyes and hearts and minds to understand this in a better way than ever before? Would we strive to live this out, God?

Would you help us fall in love with this God? Like that prisoner, would we cherish this God, instead of taking it for granted. We love you Jesus, amen.

Listen, if you're online and you need prayer, if you could just type in and someone will pray with you. If you're here in the audience and you want someone to pray with, right over here on my right, there's a prayer room and there's gonna be someone there that can pray with you. Rock Point, have a great week. Love God.