Sin of Bitterness

I was anticipating to be here again. It was, it was good to meet new people, see new faces, and feel the kindred spirit last night, where two or three are gathered together in my name. There we have a promise.

Brother Jerry was asking, where is the Lord? So many times we wonder where is the power of the Lord. Where two or three are gathered together in my name. I believe the Lord is here, and if there is somebody here that opposes the presence of the Lord, they may not want to be here.

Because when the Lord comes into your heart, into my heart, our lives change. But the reality is, every human being on earth has a deep longing to experience the Lord. And when we experience the Lord, we want to experience Him more.

And sometimes, like Jerry was talking, we stray, we try cisterns that hold no water, but it does not feel right, even after we experience the Lord. But we know, we know the true source when we feel it. I remember when I was leaving the village for the very last time, from the stories of last evening, it was very heavy on my heart to go to America and preach.

And God spoke to me, He said, go to America and tell the youth they have no idea what to even long for. It was pouring down rain, it was very cold, and I was weeping inside my helmet, and it was raining so hard I almost couldn't see where I was going. And God was ministering to my spirit that there's so many people in America that need to know, to experience, God moving is the only life worth desiring.

If, like Jerry mentioned, you are trying other things, you shall know it is not worth it. It is not worth trying sports, trying a new car. It is all vain.

Vanity of vanity, and it is cracked cistern. It holds no water, and you will need to try something else in a few weeks from now. But there is one source that makes your heart burst, and it is the joy unspeakable, full of glory.

Talking about glory, it does not exist on earth, the devil cannot offer it, but it is fullness of joy, peace that passes all understanding. I am comforted that where two or three are gathered together. Jesus is among us, the spirit of the living God, and we talk again about the first fruits, the harvest that has begun.

And as his children, we know and rest in the fact, when we bring our tithe, when we bring our first fruits, we know and trust that God in his faithfulness will bring the rest. So tonight, we rest in the power of the Holy Spirit that Jesus began the harvest. He took the first fruits to God, and there is more.

There is more of the harvest. It is ripe now. Jesus mentioned it.

It is ripe now. And the Bible talks about in Matthew that the labors are few. That is the sad part.

I think that is why the believers are burdened. We see that the labors are few. There are so many still seeking in the broken system.

Come see the cross, there it is, where love and mercy meet as the Son of God is stricken. It is often where you think least, a scene like the cross. Then see his foes like crushed beneath his feet.

If you are living a life that is not for the kingdom, it is not glorifying the Son of God that died on the cross, you are a foe of the king, and you lay crushed beneath the cross. That is the only other option for you. It is not like maybe I will win by looking somewhere else.

There is only one other option. You are crushed already. Why? Because the king has won.

You can try to prove, but it has been proven. For the conqueror has risen. It is finished.

The king of kings that sits on the right hand of God said it is finished, and it is. And as the stone is rolled away, and Christ emerges from the grave, this victory march continues till the day when every eye and heart shall see him. There is a victory march.

There is a body of believers. The faith community is marching on, and they will not stop. You may drop out, but they will not stop.

The victory march will continue until in Revelation, behold, the Lamb of God. He is worthy, and he will get the harvest that he deserves. Behold, he comes with clouds, and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierce him.

You who have chosen to try something else. Try something that looks better. The devil takes anything that God has created.

He cannot take anything else, and he perverts it, and he tries to make it look glamorous. Philippians 2, Jesus made himself of no reputation. This is often the challenge.

A little further, have the same mind of Christ. Jesus has made himself of no reputation, and he invites us to have the same mind. And then a little further down, God has exalted him, and every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess, once again we are looking at a kingdom that is already established.

We are looking at a kingdom that will march forth, the victory march is going forth, and it will never cease, this kingdom. And every eye shall see him, and now here in Philippians he says, every tongue confess, and every knee shall bow, in heaven and on earth. That will be the glorious moment.

That is the moment that we are resting in, and knowing as believers, even if, like last evening we discussed a little bit, sometimes it looks discouraging. It feels like the masses are looking elsewhere. But be encouraged.

The kingdom is advancing and marching forward and one day, you and I who remain faithful, will bow our knee, and everybody else will too. And we will confess with our mouth, truly this is the Son of God. In Luke 7, one of the Pharisees invited Jesus to come eat with him.

Come to my house, spend the evening, and let's have a meal together. And Jesus went to his house, and I don't know how he invited him in, but he was obviously proud, and maybe thought he was better than the others, because Jesus is now in his house, and he got him to come eat with him. And a woman comes in, and she falls down in front of Jesus, and she starts weeping and weeping, and washing Jesus' feet with her tears, and wiping his feet with her hair.

This is the picture of us becoming perfectly broken. Falling down in front of Jesus, completely broken. And we can talk more about that story.

There's many examples and parables in that story that we could talk about the Pharisees. But let's look at the woman. Let's look at the beautiful words this woman heard.

There is not one person in here that is not longing to hear these words. And lots of us have heard these words. As Jesus wept and wept, I'm sorry, as the woman wept and wept, Jesus knew the heart of this woman.

And he looked at the woman, and he said, your sins are forgiven. This is the longing that we have for every soul in the world. That they could hear the voice of Jesus saying, your sins are forgiven.

You are made whole. That is what revival is about. To become more whole.

I appreciated the prayer, is it Brother Arlen? When he prayed that, take the dross out of our life. Is that really our longing? In the song that we sung, the very last song, search my heart, oh God. And know if there be any wickedness in me.

Is that really the prayer we have? Do we really long to be more free? And then they had a couple questions about who Jesus is. And then Jesus said, because you believe, because of your faith, you are saved from all your sins. What a powerful, powerful statement.

There is not one of us, no not one, that has not fallen short of the glory of God. Every one of us has sinned and come short of the glory of God. But every one of us, when Jesus hung on the cross, with his arms stretched out, he received every single one of those sins.

And he is inviting you today to fall at his feet, to weep and wash his feet, because he has the power to save you from all your sins. And then he said, go in peace. This is what happens when we fall at the feet of Jesus.

He gives us peace. Every soul in the whole world is longing for peace. And you, as we discussed last evening, are not here by accident.

It is divine appointment that you are here this evening. God has invited you. He has called you, and he wants you to go in peace.

He wants you to go in a deeper peace than before. God wants us to experience the peace that passes all understanding. We know that in the world, many things want to creep in and steal the peace.

Jerry and John and all the believers that have been believers for a long time, we know that things come up in our life that want to steal our peace, right? There is only one way to go get it again, and that is to go to the cross and experience once again Jesus saying, go in peace. He will take it all. He will take anything.

He is not like the first Adam who blames the other person. He is the second Adam. I am just sharing a few of these parables and stories to show you a picture of coming to Jesus and giving it all to him.

Jesus is willing. He longs to set you free. There is a story in the book of Isaiah that I just love.

I love the picture of when Isaiah had a vision. He had a vision and he was in the presence of the Lord. Isaiah chapter 6, I think it is.

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of his robe filled the temple. This was a glorious vision. Above it stood Seraphim.

Each one had six wings. With two he covered his face. Thank you so much.

And with two he flew. And one cried to another and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of glory.

And the posts of the door shook by the voice of the one who cried out. And the house was filled with smoke. This was the vision that Isaiah was having.

And he sensed that he is in the presence of the most holy. And he said, it is well with me for I am undone and of an unclean lip. And then he thought about the people.

And he said, I dwell in the midst of a people of an unclean lip. For my eyes have seen the king. And he sensed that he must die.

This is a place, if you resist the call of God on your heart, you must know that one day you will come into the presence of the most holy God. And you will sense that I must die. And this death is eternal.

There is either eternal life or eternal death. There is no two other choices. There is only two.

You cannot choose the third one or the fourth one. And when you come into the presence of the most holy one, you will feel like Isaiah did. And in this vision, something happens that God is inviting you to experience.

He invites me to experience it. One of the angels with the tongues, he got a glowing ember. Maybe Isaiah thought, gee, I knew it, he's going to kill me.

He comes toward Isaiah with a glowing ember and he touches Isaiah's lip. And then Isaiah hears the beautiful words. Behold, this has touched your lips.

Your iniquity is taken away and your sins are forgiven. This was the touch of the Holy Spirit for Isaiah. There is somebody longing to touch you, to touch your lips, to touch your heart and to make you holy.

And I also heard the voice of the Lord saying, the Lord himself, whom shall I send and who will go? This was a vision about going and telling the world that we're talking about that is so lost. The burden that we talk about. We see so many people following the lust of the flesh, longing to find the peace.

And there is one place in the presence of the Holy of Holies. And God will touch you with the coal and set you free and forgive all of your sins. This is where we long to invite people to.

And after Isaiah experienced it, God said, you will use him. Isaiah said, here I am, send me. This is what you feel.

When you are set free, you want the whole world to know. I think all of us remember, Jerry talked about our first love, when we couldn't keep silent. Are we still at that place? Are we still at the place where we cannot keep silent? And the radiance of our faith just gives us away, wherever we go.

The people know there is something, there is something I'm longing for. This is where God wants us to stay. And often in revival meetings, we talk about things that steal and rob our first love, that creep into our lives.

I love the one psalm, and I use it often. Oh what joy for those whose disobedience is forgiven, whose sin is put out of sight. None of us like to walk around burdened down with sin.

Sin steals the life right out of our emotions, right out of our energy, our physical life. Sin has only one consequence, and it is death. And we don't want to die.

So we battle against death, but we choose sin sometimes. This psalmist was so free. What joy for those whose record the Lord has cleared of guilt.

When your record is cleared, that means there is none, there is no guilt. There is no guilt in your heart tonight. If there is any hidden sin, if there is anything in your life that is hindering you from experiencing the fullness of joy, then you do not feel like the psalmist.

What joy for those whose record is cleared of guilt, whose lives are lived in complete honesty. When I refuse to confess my sin, what happens? Do you know? The psalmist says, my body wasted away. When I refuse to confess my sin, my body wasted away.

It is a physical damage for us to cling to sin. The Lord wants to clear us from all our guilt and set us free to experience health, to experience the fullness of joy and not be torn down. Day and night, your hand of discipline was heavy on me, and I groaned all day long.

My strength evaporated like water in the summer heat. You can think about cisterns with cracks. Finally, I confess all my sins, all of them.

You can be a pretty good person. You can think you are not as bad as the other person, your neighbor. Maybe you have never committed adultery.

Maybe you have never stolen something. But deep in your heart, you may be hiding. You may be clinging to a sin, and this sin is stealing your strength and it evaporates like water in the summer sun.

Gradually, your strength leaves. When I stop trying to hide my guilt, and I confess all my sins, I said to myself, I will confess all my rebellion to the Lord, and He forgave me. And all my guilt is gone.

All my guilt is gone. This is what the Psalmist said. All my guilt is gone.

There is none that I'm hanging on to. This evening, I felt God clearly speaking to me one morning to talk to you about a sin that often steals and robs us, and sometimes we're not aware of it. Many times, I believe, for us believers, we're not aware of this sin.

It creeps into our life, and we let it rob our joy, until sometimes, finally, God opens our eyes. And I have no idea why God laid this on my heart, but I do know that He opened my eyes already. And so I bless God for that.

God wants to set us free, and by setting me a little freer, I believe that He can use me, like Isaiah, a little more. And so this evening, I have no idea, maybe this was only for me, but God laid on my heart one morning so heavily, that there's so many of us walking around with this sin in our life, and we let it control us. We let it manipulate us.

We make decisions according. There was a woman in the Bible that had a beautiful name. Her name meant joyful, full of joy, laughter.

She was married and had two sons, and there was a famine in the land, and so she moved away with her husband to a place where there was more food, and then her husband passed away. Her two sons had married ladies from there, and then her two sons passed away. This woman's name was Naomi, and she became a bitter woman.

Do we read in the Bible that she became bitter? We read in the Bible that she said, my name will no longer be Naomi. Naomi means joyful, full of joy. Call me Mara.

This word means bitter. And so when she finally moved back, it's a long story, you know the story. When she finally moved back to her land, the people came out and said, is that you Naomi? And she said, no, don't call me Naomi.

Call me Mara. Because God has sent bitterness into my life. Who was she blaming? She was blaming God.

The Bible says, the Almighty One has made my life bitter. And Naomi said, why call me Naomi when my life is so bitter? So Naomi had turned to a bitter person, and she chose to have that name. God had not chosen that name for Naomi.

God had not chosen that name for you. Naomi chose a name that God had not given her, because she did not know the whole picture. Did you know that often in our lives, things are happening that we do not understand, and we don't know the whole picture? Do you know the rest of the story? Naomi became the grandmother of who? Boaz, and then Jesse, and King David, a man after God's own heart.

The Bible talks about Naomi one day. I imagine she was selfish, full of herself. She was bitter.

We don't read all the details, but this one man who wrote the book talked about when Naomi took her focus off of herself, and she started helping her daughter-in-law, giving her advice, go to Boaz, we know the story, and do this, and do this. Then God restored her joy. And the Bible says that when the son was born, when Boaz was born, I'm sorry, when Boaz's son was born, Obed, they gave the son to Naomi, and she raised the son as if it was her own, and he was better for her than seven sons would have been.

That's what the Bible says. He was better for her than seven sons would have been. There's significance in the seven sons thing.

But this one son, and Naomi's joy, I believe, was restored. I believe she embraced once again her name, the name Naomi that God had given her, that she had been given. It meant joyful.

I don't think she wanted the name bitterness. We cannot read that anybody, the Father, the Bible, anywhere else, that anybody called her bitter. Only she chose to have that name.

So when God laid the message on my heart about bitterness often hiding in our heart, I really feel that there's so many of us going through life. We want to be holy. We claim to be holy.

And we're holding people in bondage. We hold each other in bondage. And you know that when we do that, we hold ourselves in bondage.

So many times we hold ourselves in bondage. We cannot flourish. We cannot bloom.

We ask the question, where is God? Where is the work of the Lord? Where is the joy of the Lord that I used to have? There's many things that steal that joy. One thing I believe so often, maybe for more mature believers, bitterness wants to creep in. It is the man we disagree with.

Maybe he wronged us. I think it is important for us to disagree with people. There is many false prophets.

And a man who agrees with anybody and anything will fall for anything. It is very important that we know where we stand and what we believe. But in the disagreement so often, we believe that we have to have a way to prove that they are wrong and we are right.

This is where I believe the sin is in my life so often. Why do I need to prove that I am right and they are wrong? Did Jesus prove it? I think the sin of bitterness often grows up gradually. We feel in our hearts that we have a disagreement and we want to lay it down.

But we want to prove our point just a little bit yet. And so we relive it in our mind and we think and rethink how we will have our next conversation. Does any of you ever do that? You think about, when I approach and discuss it next time, how I am going to discuss it? What I am going to say? Do you think it is important for us, if we rest in Christ, to prepare ourselves for that conversation? The Bible says that we should not even think about what we are going to say when we get arrested.

I think if we are in the Living Word, we do not have to think about how I am going to prove, what kind of eloquent words I am going to use to show that man that he is wrong. That is what we so often want to do. That is the sign of bitterness starting to creep.

Proverbs says to guard your heart with all diligence for out of it flow the issues of life. This is, I believe, why we gather tonight. To study our heart, search our heart, guard it with all diligence.

What is in there that we do not want to have flowing out? The issues of life will flow out. When you have the confrontation, when you have the discussion, maybe you did not premeditate it. When there is something in your heart, if it is bitterness, if it is lust, something will flow out that you do not want to flow out.

And if you were claiming to be part of the kingdom, we talked about last night, of the resurrected people, you do not want the draught to flow out. The draught needs to flow out at the cross. That is where you need to take it and be purified.

There was a man who had a minor surgery. He just had a minor surgery but they had to sedate him to do the surgery and in his sedation when he was unconscious, whatever, they moved him from the stretcher to a bed. Three days later he had a really, really sore neck and it was very painful and he did not know what is causing this.

So, he went to see another doctor and the doctor said he has a badly pinched nerve and something happened when they moved him from the stretcher to the bed and then the way he lay until he came out of sedation and he will have to live with it. There is nothing to do about it. The pain was much worse than the little thing that he had gone in for a surgery for.

And he suffered with it. And he suffered with it for years. He was a pastor and he was so bitter.

He said he will never forgive that doctor. Why a doctor doing something like that to a person and then just saying there is nothing to do. There was another doctor that concluded there is nothing to do about it.

But the first doctor had heard him. He should be held accountable, right? Surely. Surely he should pay him now if he is not able to function, right? And one day God laid on his heart to release the doctor.

You are called to release this. And when he released it, he was immediately healed. Twenty-three years later now, he has not felt it yet.

He was immediately healed. The pinched nerve became unpinched. This is, I believe, what God can do.

He does not maybe always, but He can do it. When we bring our bitterness, when we bring our feelings of revenge, maybe it is just an ache in our heart that this man has proved me wrong. When the prodigal son came back and they had this big feast, what did the eldest son do? I think he turned to bitterness.

He was upset. He said, didn't I serve you all these years and I did anything you asked me to do without complaining and you never even killed a little goat for me. And here comes your other son that squandered everything.

He blew all the inheritance for women and drinks and all the pleasures of life and you killed the fattest calf. How is this fair? What I want to point out in this lesson is that the party, the celebration was going on. Did the celebration stop because he was bitter? It did not stop.

The celebration went right on. He just robbed himself of joining in the celebration. The song, the victory march is going on.

You can choose if you are going to join in the celebration or not. It is not fair that the man that murdered somebody, that slept with five other women, it is not fair that they go to heaven and I never did anything that bad, so I will not join the celebration. It is fair because this is who the King is.

This is who our Savior is. He invites everybody and that is why it is such a joy to share the gospel because everybody is invited. Anybody is invited.

And our loan is all the same. Our reward is all the same. It is beautiful.

This son just robbed himself of experiencing the celebration. Bitterness will rob you of experiencing the Kingdom. Maybe yesterday, maybe today, you were empty.

You were longing inside to feel the presence of the Lord, to feel the Holy Spirit minister to yourself. Maybe bitterness is robbing you from experiencing it. Bitterness often makes you make choices that you never thought you would.

If you stop and think, where am I going in life now and why am I here? People often do not want to do that. We lose our first love. We lose our vision and we keep convincing ourselves that this is the right way.

We do not take the Word of God and measure it and ask ourselves, when I first experienced the King, is this what He asked from me? Is this what my soul longed after? And we grow gradually colder and colder. We justify things that we had not justified before because we want to prove to the man that disagreed with us that we are right. And many times, when that starts to happen, we turn into the person exactly who we thought we would never turn into.

In fact, we often turn into the person that the man that disagreed with us said we were. Take a look at a story of two businessmen. They were in business together and the one man became very greedy and he sinned against the second man.

He took a lot of the money and he ruined the second man's reputation in the community. He told people he's hard to work with, you can't get along with him, you shouldn't work with him, and he took the business and left. The second man became very bitter, as you can imagine.

He had a right to become bitter, right? Surely the community should figure out and find out that this man has wronged me. The first man lived his life possibly very convicted, very guilty, but so did the second man. He became very sick.

He was often sick and couldn't function well and he became the exact person that the first man said he is. He became hard to work with, nobody wanted to work for him. He was often upset because he couldn't prove to the people that he was the right one.

If he would have known the king who he was serving, it wouldn't have been important. It is not important for us to prove that we are right. Why do we know it is not important for us to prove that we are right? Did Jesus.

Well, look at that. When we first became born again, and when I became anointed, one night I was on the bedroom floor just pleading with God, and I hope all of you seek the Lord. The Holy Spirit does not just come.

He does not just come because I am going to anoint you. I am going to anoint you. The Holy Spirit comes to the people who seek after Him.

And the Bible says, if you are not born of the Spirit, you are none of His. God longs to pour out the Spirit on you, but you need to welcome it. You need to invite it.

And I was in a fierce struggle and I was on the floor praying because we have become born again and we long to share the Gospel. And we were sharing the Gospel with a lot of children. We were giving the hearts to Jesus and it was the joy of the Lord.

We rejoiced a lot. We sang a lot. We worshipped a lot.

In a simple faith, it was beautiful. But then there were a lot of rumors floating around the community, and they were not nice rumors at all. I bless God for the wife I had that stood with me and prayed for me.

And those rumors were a lot about immorality and things that we were in. That was not true. It was not true.

But try to prove to a community that already doesn't like the way you think, that those are not true. And we knew the source. We knew that these were men who were convicted.

We were at a meeting one night when there was a clear call for them to surrender, and they refused. And we knew that they were convicted. And what else is there to do but to ruin us? Because guess what? They will try to prove that they are right.

And so will we if we let our sinful nature overtake. And this was a longing we had to show people that this is not true. We are right.

But it's not important. But what I want to tell you is, the struggles that came into my life were very real. And the devil wanted me to go exactly where those men said we were.

If I would have become bitter, I would have ended up and been the exact person that they said I was. This was very clear in my life. I started, every morning I passed this one man's property, and I started praying for him.

When I came to the fence until it was over, his property ended. This was a choice I made in my heart to remind myself that I'm not the person that he said I am. And with a compassion that God would work in his life.

Because if he is wrong, there is one place that God will take the wrong. Either he will take it to the cross, or he will take it to hell. There is only two things that God does with sin and wrong.

If we bring it to the cross, he will take it. If we do not bring it to the cross, he cannot take it. And where else does sin end up? The wages of sin is death.

The second man, one night was laying in bed sick. He had become the man that the first man said he was. This was years later.

And God really, really convicted him. And he physically opened the window, put out his hand and released the first man. He said, God, I'm going to give him to you to let him prosper.

Whatever you want for him, he is yours. He has manipulated me, he has for too long controlled my life, and I will no longer let him control my life. The second man, as you already think, probably, became healthy.

This was draining him from his physical strength. Did you know that when you are wrestling somebody, you get tired? This is not only physically. But get the picture.

When you are wrestling somebody, if it is your dad, if it is your mom, you get tired. And this drains your strength. And the second man, if you long to read the word and become rejuvenated, but you're wrestling, and you sense that it is dry, the word is not alive.

Maybe your strength is all going into holding somebody bondage. And this is putting yourself into bondage. Paul said, Alexander the coppersmith has done me much harm, and I'm going to prove to the people that he is wrong.

Right? Is that what he said? The Lord will reward him. I will just give it up to God, and he will reward Alexander to whatever he deserves. We can learn so much of Paul.

Vengeance is mine, says the Lord. Romans 12, dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God.

For the scripture says, I will take revenge. I will pay them back, says the Lord. Think about the person that you are holding in bondage.

Think about the person that is controlling your life, and that you would just love to prove wrong. And think about the two options. If it is a loved one, do you want the Spirit of the Lord to work in the loved one's life? If so, the sooner you release him, the more time God has.

If you hold him in bondage, or her, and you die in this way, and he dies in that way, there is only two options. Vengeance is mine, says the Lord. I will repay him.

Can you do better than God? Maybe you have a better plan. Is there something that you think you could do better than taking the wrong that this person did to you, and just give it to the cross, and let the blood of Jesus absorb it, or take it to hell? Those are the two options. God will have a righteous judgment.

And he will either take all the sins, and everything that somebody wronged you with, he will take it at the cross. And if you don't want your friend, the loved one that hurt you, if you don't want them to experience the joy and the peace that you have, if you say you are part of the resurrected body, then hold them. Wrestle them.

Keep them in bondage. But if you would long for them to have the joy of the Lord, to experience life abundant, then relieve them. Bring them to the altar and let them there.

Just give them to the Lord. Stick your hand out the window and let them go. God will take care of it.

He said he would in his word. If it was really an injustice that a person did to you, vengeance is mine, says the Lord. If you are one of God's children, that means he will take care of all the wrongs that were ever done against you.

We read earlier, every eye shall see him, even the ones that pierced him. Everybody that hurt the knock, and they know that today is the day of salvation, and they refuse to call, we are piercing the heart of God. And one day every eye shall behold.

And if there is somebody that you love that has hurt you, and you hold them in bondage, but you would still love to see them go to heaven. You would still love to see them live in the kingdom, experience life abundant. The only life worth living.

The life we talked about when we started, that most people don't even know to long for. If you want them to experience this life, release them. So you can experience it, and so that God can work in them.

These two businessmen, later on in life, it's sad that so often we go through life, and the bigger part of our life we spend holding grudges, fighting, trying to prove we're right. And finally in the end, these two businessmen were reestablished together, and the first man became so convicted one night that he came to see the second man, and he repented. And he wept, and he said he knows that he ruined his reputation.

We don't know, but had the second man never released him, would God have been able to work that miracle? It's a miracle. Redemption's a miracle. When something becomes restored, it's a miracle.

Only the blood of Jesus can touch these situations. But woe for us believers, the saints, to walk around holding other saints sometimes in bondage, and in this way putting ourselves in bondage. When we look at the first Adam, he sinned.

We know he sinned. He took the fruit, and he ate it. And what did he say? It's not my fault, it's Eve's fault.

He blamed somebody else. And then we look at the second Adam, that Hebrews talks about. We read about it.

He made himself no reputation, and God exalted him, and every knee will bow, and every tongue will confess that he is the Son of God. Even those who pierced him in Revelation, even those who hardened their hearts, and glory to God, all of us who are part of the kingdom, we will rejoice on that day. Today God is asking us to release people that we are holding in bondage, so we can experience more freedom, and so they can.

Do we even believe that God would work in their hearts? I think God wants to do a work in our community. When we start releasing our parents, start releasing wherever we came from, there are so many people who we think are wrong, and we think we are right. It is only the grace of God if he showed us the way of eternal life.

And this is nothing to boast about. This is inhumility for us to intercede for the people we think are wrong. And we know if they are putting their hope in a false God, that there is no hope.

And therefore our hearts should be broken with a compassion, but not a bitterness. There is no room for us to hold them in bondage and think God will take care of them. He will, but this should make us sad.

Vengeance is mine, says the Lord. There was a man in Europe many years ago. He was a very godly single man.

I think he sometimes prayed like we sang this evening. Search my heart, O God. Let's all continue to pray.

Show me, Lord. Show me, Lord, where I can be more sanctified, more holy. This young man was praying, Lord, help me to be more like Jesus.

Help me to be more like Jesus. Do we even want to be like Jesus? When we come to the realization that we may look to everybody as the wrong person, Jesus could have hung on the cross. He could have convinced with a powerful message, his audience, that I am right and you are all wrong.

With the spoken word, all the people could have fallen over dead, all his enemies, and the people could have proclaimed, this is the Messiah. This is the King we were waiting for. Look at what happened.

Was that important to Jesus? What did Jesus do? He opened his arms and he welcomed everybody. He welcomed everybody. If he would have proved at that moment and chummed off the cross, what hope for you and me? Once again, the people did not see the whole story.

They did not understand what is happening. Many times, you and I do not understand what is happening. Why somebody that claims to be a Christian views us the way they do? Why? It is not important that we understand.

It is important that we know that we are resting in the Kingdom and walking in the Kingdom and out of this flow the issue of life. If it is dirty in our heart, this will flow out. This man that prayed, Lord, I want to be more like Jesus, he was a very godly man.

He convicted people with his life. One day a young lady came to his door, knocked on the door and the young man, his name was Henry Zuzo. Henry came to the door and opened the door and the lady, he was living on a street lined with houses in Europe, and the lady throws the little baby into his arms and he said, here is the fruit of your sin.

Take care of it. That is what the young lady said. And the neighbors heard it.

And the prostitute ran off. She did not like Henry Zuzo because he was a godly young man and she was a prostitute. And all the neighbors said, now we know what Henry does in his secret life.

Now we know what he does when nobody is watching. And in that second, she trashed his reputation. Totally.

He was supposed to be the witness. Why did this happen to a young man who said, Lord, I want to be more like Jesus? Why did this happen? And Henry took the baby, went into his living room, knelt on the floor and said, God, what should I do with this baby? I have never seen this woman before. And here she brings this and convinces the whole community that I am the sinner.

And the Lord spoke to his heart. The Lord said, do like Jesus did. Jesus absorbed the sins of others and so should you.

Henry Zuzo raised the son as his own. God had a powerful plan for this little baby. Many, many years later, an old lady comes into the village.

And she gathers the village people together. And she tells them all that this is not Henry's son that he raised. But it was okay for Henry.

He loved the son. That was not his son. He had an adopted son that I believe God wanted him to have.

And the Lord did a work in Henry's life by answering his prayer. When you and I pray, Lord, make me more like Jesus, is this what we want to happen? Do we want somebody to convince the whole community that we are wrong and they are right? Is this really what we want to happen? No, our flesh does not want this. But are we willing to absorb the sins of others? If not, there is a good chance that you harbor bitterness in your heart.

If you are not willing to look like the person that was wrong. See, harboring bitterness in our life often motivate us to make choices in the wrong direction. And I mentioned earlier, if you are gradually going a direction that you never thought you would, search your heart.

Ask the Lord to point out not only bitterness, but any sin. Search your heart. If there is sin in there, you will not make mature choices that lead in the direction that you want your family to go, that you want to personally go.

You cannot make clear choices. You cannot analyze in your mind, what kind of a marriage do I want? What kind of a partner do I choose? You will not make those choices silently. It is very important for us to stop and think.

Where do I want to be in five years from now? Where do I want to be working in the Kingdom? If our life is leading us the wrong path, there is sin leading us to death. And we need to recognize and admit that death is eternal. You can shrug it off today, but one day, you are face to face with what Isaiah saw, and it is not only a vision, and you will say, it is woe with me, because I will die, because I have seen the Lord.

This is reality. This is reality for some of us. I hope not in here, but according to the Bible, many people, many people will face the reality of coming face to face with Jesus.

And instead of rejoicing, instead of bending their knees and confessing with a hallelujah on our lips, that the King has come to deliver us. Maybe for once and for all to prove our enemies that they were wrong, because there are many scriptures that this will happen. Our enemies lay crushed beneath His feet.

If you are one of them, you do not want to be crushed. We still have the opportunity today to bring all our brokenness to the cross. Lay it at the feet of Jesus and become one of the unbroken cisterns where streams of living water gush from your bellies, the Bible says, from the depths of your heart.

I think so often we do not get the picture that in the very recesses of our heart, what is there? According to the Bible, streams of living water should be gushing out from the depths of our heart and touching people. People who harshly disagree with us will sense and they will, they cannot resist the love of God. I think lots of us have testimonial people we love that disagree with us and we are good friends.

There are so many. There is something about my family that I love so much, my mom and dad. And I know they do not agree with me in every area, but for the last eight years, we had the opportunity of blessing them, of loving them.

It is not important that they are proved wrong. They may have a testimony that is simple. Maybe they were not called to the same calling we are.

Maybe God wants them there. We do not know. And even if they think that we were so desperately wrong when we left the Amish, this has nothing to do with proving that they are wrong for being there.

Laura has a very godly father and I know that he is born again. He loves the Lord. He does not agree with everything we do, but when your life is a testimony.

Eight years ago, he would not have admitted. One day he mentioned that. He always thought it would not work and it does not work to leave the Amish, but he is not sure anymore.

Not because we made a lot of words to prove him wrong. I believe that our life speaks in the New Covenant. See, in the Old Covenant, sometimes people had a ministry, like Samson, and it appears like he fulfilled the call that God had on his life, but his life was not very godly.

In the New Covenant, our ministry flows out of our life. We cannot serve two masters. I do not know that they could back then.

I am not saying. But if your life is hiding something, if you are not who you claim to be, the ministry that flows out of your life will have rotten fruits. You all know the Scripture and probably all night you were thinking about this Scripture.

I want to say it is in Hebrews, but I do not think it is. Let me quickly turn to it. Yes, it is in Hebrews 12.

Looking diligently, lest any man fail of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, thereby doing what? Defile many, contaminating many. And some translations talk about the poisonous root. When there is a poisonous root in the depths, in the recesses of your heart, and you think that your fruit will taste delightful, and that the people that you are sure are wrong and you do not really like them are going to long after the delicious, sweet-smelling fruit on your tree, this is not happening.

That is not how this kingdom works. When the poisonous root is in your heart, we know that a root is often under the surface. A root is often hidden.

And when there is a poisonous root there, it is after all where the tree gets its nourishment. And so when the leaves are brown, when there is no fruit, when it is not vibrant, there is maybe a poisonous root somewhere. We need to figure out what is wrong with this tree.

When your life, maybe you are trying to convince everybody else that I love Jesus, but your life proves that you are bitter, that you long after the world. Maybe you love music that contaminates your mind every day you listen to it. There is not a chance, there is not a chance that you will have fruit that is sweet-smelling on your tree if the root is contaminated.

So instead of trying to fool people that can see it anyways, repent and confess. That is the invitation Jesus gives. Now when you do this, you will gain strength.

You will gain strength to fight the battle. You will no longer be drained and your energy will vanish like the water vapors into sunshine. You will have the strength to walk victorious.

And when there are well-meaningful men in your life who can see that somewhere you have a contaminated root, listen to them. They recognize that you are following after the lust of the flesh. You are following after things that are not leading to life.

They are not leading to good health. They know by experience that you will end up somewhere where you don't want to end up. And there is only two options.

Either you will take it to the cross or God will take it to hell. We do not like the thought of eternal death. That is why God, who did not like the thought of eternal death, opened the way.

That is why He allowed Himself to be nailed on the cross to look like He is the one that was wrong for our sake. He was willing for the whole community to think that He was wrong for John's sake, for my sake, to one day have the righteous judgment. There is a psalm that I long for all of us to be able to say.

And when I read this, most of you know this psalm well. Let all that I am praise the Lord. And when I read that, I want you to hear all.

Let all that I am praise the Lord. Sometimes we love to praise the Lord on Sundays. We long to praise the Lord a little bit more.

But then on Mondays, we are consumed with what you talked about earlier, money. We are consumed with things that steal our joy and rob our joy. We are consumed with proving to somebody that we can, even if they said we can't.

We are consumed with the lust of the flesh. We feel and know that there is no victory. Why? Because we refused.

We refused the call of salvation. Today is the day of salvation. We refused it.

And next week, we are still living the life of defeat. We are still listening to the songs that will end up in eternal death. We are still meditating on things that end up in eternal death.

We cannot think clearly to make choices. How will my family turn out? What is the best for my family? Because we are consumed with the world. Let all that I am praise the Lord.

With my whole heart, not just a little bit of my heart, with my whole heart, I will praise His holy name. When we think of coming boldly, as Ephesians says, to the throne of grace, did you know that if there is sin hidden in our hearts, we cringe. We cringe of coming into the presence of God.

Because we know, something in a human being knows, when you meet a holy God, you die, unless you come through Jesus Christ. And if you come through Jesus Christ, this means that you have been cleansed and purified and touched by His Holy Spirit. Now you can come to His holy presence.

With my whole heart, I will praise His holy name. Let all that I am praise the Lord. May I never forget the good things He does for me.

He forgives all my sins. You don't have to leave this place with even one sin in your life. He forgives all my sins.

And what else? He heals all my diseases. He redeems me from death. The death that we have been talking about.

None of us has to die. I am so joyful in my heart that none of you will come to the throne of the Father and say, I didn't know. I didn't know that Jesus takes away my sins.

Because you know. You know that He takes all your sins away. And He heals all your sicknesses.

And He delivers you from death. You do not need to die anymore. You can live a resurrected life.

The harvest has begun. Jesus brought some of the first fruits. And we get to bring more.

More of the first fruits. He redeems me from death and crowns me with love and tender mercy. This is what He crowns us with.

Come see the cross. This was our verse today. Come see the cross.

Where love and mercy meet. And then He crowns you with love and tender mercy. And this is who you are as you walk in the kingdom.

As you go to see your relatives. As you go to meet the man that has wronged you. Who are you? You are a man that is crowned with love and tender mercy.

When you see the cross, where love and mercy meet, you become more like Jesus. You absorb the sin of whoever wronged you. It is okay.

He fills my life with good things. My youth is renewed like an eagle. He has removed, listen to this, He has removed our sins as far as the east is from the west.

And the Bible talks about in Micah, the Lord Him throwing their sins into the depths of the ocean. When you throw something into the depths of the ocean and then you tell somebody to go get it again, it's hard to get. It's hard to find.

Even the best snorkeler would have a challenge to find it. Or the deep sea diver. When Jesus takes those sins, the people that you release, and you put it into the depths of the ocean, you choose to let God do that.

And tomorrow you are tempted, remember that Jesus cannot find it anymore. You will have a hard time finding it. The man that you released has been released.

And you no longer need to use the energy to hold him in bondage. You know, I get this picture of, for the very last time in our life, wrestling a person. And instead of wrestling him to prove him wrong, wrestling him to the altar.

One more time, wrestle him to the altar. And then put him there. And with an anticipation, know that the blood of Jesus is going to touch him.

He's at a very dangerous place now. If the blood of Jesus touches him, you will become brothers and sisters in Christ. And that is called redemption.

And you will have a more beautiful relationship than you ever did. This is what we long for. We all long for us to leave totally, completely free.

When I think about becoming completely free, I think of a little book. A little book that was translated in more languages than any other book besides the Bible. And the book is called The Pilgrim's Progress.

Written by John Bunyan. And as the pilgrim, after having been taken to the ferry, whatever they called that in the book, the Vanity Fair. After being taken to the Vanity Fair, he was offered everything the world had to offer.

It was right there for him to have if he wanted it. If he would just come back to the world that he used to live in. If he would only start serving the flesh again and stop convicting the people along his path.

They would give him all of that. The enemy did not like to see this man on the path that he was on. And he comes struggling up the last hill.

And he meets three angels. And he had a heavy burden on his back. And in his pack he had all kinds of things of people who had wronged him along the way.

Many people tried to wrestle him. He got caught in the swamp and people tried to pull him down. And he had all of those things on his pack.

And the first angel he met, the angel of dawn, cut the pack. Lose off his back. And the pack rolled and tumbled down the hill.

All of the weight of the things that had been wronged against him, rolled off. He became free of all those things. And the angel said, Thy sins have been forgiven.

This was what Pilgrim had been longing for. Thy sins have been forgiven. And then the second angel comes.

The angel of twilight. And this angel took off all his old clothing. He took off the cloak of bitterness.

He took off the cloak of impurity. All the dirty stains. He took off all his old clothing, his coat that was stained from the fight and the battle.

And he gave him a new coat. And it talks about in the book how Pilgrim started to weep. With tears rolling down his face, he fell at their feet because he was being delivered from the burdens on his back.

He was being given a new coat. And this is the invitation we have. I think Pilgrim or John Bunyan who wrote that remembered the woman in Luke 7. How she knelt at the feet of Jesus and wept.

It is good to weep over our sins. It is good to go and give it all to God. Let the pack roll off your shoulder.

Roll down the hill where it belongs. Let the devil have that part. But you will go with the angel and receive the new coat on the cross where love and mercy meet.

And in this way you will have more love and mercy for the people who wronged you. Father, we come to you in the precious almighty powerful name of Jesus Christ. We know that you love mercy.

You made a way for us. We love so many people that we long withdraw closer to you. This evening I pray that us as your saints would come and purify ourselves and release anybody that we have held bondage.

Help us tonight to be done with wanting to prove that we are right. But rest in the fact that we are right. We are right with you Jesus.

And because of this we can come into your holy presence. And because of this we believe and rest that streams of living waters can flow from the depth of our belly. And anybody who has ever wronged us, you can do a work in their heart because we no longer hold them bondage.

God, I pray that tonight as you work in these people's lives that many people will be released in here and by this releasing many people will be released outside. God, I plead for souls that are wandering away from you. I plead that you would speak to them and that they would walk away from any peer pressure, anything that is holding them to death, that tonight they would turn away from the road to eternal death and they would turn to the road of eternal life.

If their buddies, if their friends choose to continue on the road to eternal death, God, I pray that they will release them and intercede for their souls. Thank you that no one needs to perish but that all of us can have eternal life. In Jesus' name we pray.