The Healing Word

Guest (Male): The healing word ministry on one place is brought to you by the generous donations of people like you. At any time during today's message, feel free to send a prayer request or make a donation using the links provided. Now, I pray you will be blessed as Pastor Jack Morris delivers a message from the word of God that will encourage and strengthen your faith in him.

Pastor Jack Morris: It's never too late to get in touch with God's plan for your life. Never too late. Today is the day of salvation.

Guest (Male): Welcome to the healing word, a radio ministry of the Largo Community Church. Here's Pastor Jack Morris with today's message that will grow your faith in God and lead you to a closer walk with Jesus.

Pastor Jack Morris: A reformed church pastor tells the story of when he was young, how that I I suspect he knew that he was going to be a minister someday, be a pastor feeling the call of God. He was in his middle and late teens and so he loved the church and spent as much time with the pastor as he possibly could. On this one occasion, the pastor told him that he was the pastor was going to a meeting and he was going to take some friends to that meeting and he invited this young man who later became a pastor himself, invited him to go to the meeting to sit up front with the senior pastor in the car and and go along.

Now, the senior pastor told the younger pastor, the younger man before he was a pastor, he said, now wear a suit and a tie. He said, I want you to be dressed up and you sit up front and we'll I'll drive the folks to the meeting and you can go with me. And be outside your house at such and such a time because that's when I'm going to pick you up. Now, we don't have any time to spare, so you be standing there right outside your house so I can just swing by and you jump in we can go.

So the young man right on time standing outside waiting for the senior pastor to come. Looked at his watch 10 minutes late. Senior pastor said we're we can't waste any time. I have to pick you up. We have to go right to the meeting. 20 minutes went by, half hour went by. Young man stood there, an hour went by. He knew he had been forgotten. And he said, now the senior pastor I I have no ill will feeling against him. He said that happened so many years ago. He said pastors are human and sometimes they forget.

Now, don't you forget that I'm human and sometimes I forget. Will you? Okay, good. I'll try to remember and sometimes I need a jog, but to keep a lot in my mind, sometimes I just miss it. He said, but that feeling of being forgotten. He said all these years and now I'm a pastor, I can understand why the other pastor forgot me, but he said I cannot forget being forgotten. He said, isn't that strange? Now, that's that's a that's a feeling that I'm sure we've all experienced sometime or other in our lives. We were forgotten.

We were overlooked. Someone missed us. Someone important to us. You know, sometimes we feel that way about God. You ever feel that way about God that that God doesn't remember you, he's forgotten you, he's overlooked you, he hasn't heard your prayer. I think all of us have felt that way sometime or other. Children children want to be remembered. Now, even babies. You take a baby, you've been holding that baby in your arm and you put that baby down in a crib, it wants to be picked up again. It'll let you know I'm I'm here and the baby will cry.

Even children. Remember when you were children, you got your first two wheel bike and you said, look mom, no hands. Look mom, you want mom to look at you. Right now, you do have God's attention, whether you feel like it or not, regardless of how sad you are, regardless of the valley, the depth that you're going through, you have God's attention. Can you say praise the Lord?

Guest (Male): Praise the Lord.

Pastor Jack Morris: You do have God's attention. Philip Yancey, the author said these words, wrote these words. We need not bang a drum or bring an animal sacrifice to get God's full attention. We already have it. God's looking at you right now and he sees you and he desires to bless you and to help you regardless of our feelings. Don't trust your feelings, trust the word of God that says you're engraved on God's hands. There was a prophet named Elijah in 1 Kings 19. He called all the prophets of Baal together. There was that time of indecision. The prophets of Baal saying Baal, this heathen God Baal was the God and then they tried to serve God a little bit on the side, the almighty God.

That they couldn't make up their mind. Do I serve my wishes? Do I serve my finances? Do I serve my life? Do I serve my pleasures and then I get a little bit of church once in a while? And Elijah said, listen, listen, if God is God, then serve him. And if God is not God and Baal is God and your pleasures and your finances and and that's what you're worshiping, then go for it. But make up your mind who you're going to serve. Either God is God and serve him or he isn't God, then get out and quit being so wishy-washy.

And so Elijah called them together and I'm praying today that the Holy Spirit would come and speak to our hearts and help us to know and make a decision for God or against God because if you're not really serving the Lord with all your heart, you're not a happy content person. You really can't be. You really can't be. And so Elijah said, listen, if God's God, then serve him. If the God that answers by fire, let him be God. And so Elijah told the prophets of Baal, you go first. We'll build the altar. I'll help you build the altar.

I'm doing a little paraphrasing now, so reading between the lines. He said if I'll help you build the altar, we'll put that altar up. We'll put the the sacrifice on the altar. We'll put the water on the altar and the God that answers by fire, let him be God. Elijah said to the prophets of Baal who agreed to that, you go first. The prophets of Baal began to pray. They prayed, they hooped, they hollered, they shouted all the way up until noon. Noon came, nothing happened. No fire. So Elijah he had a little bit more nerve than I would have had in that condition.

He said, listen, your God might have gone to sleep. Maybe he's maybe he's on a journey. You have to call a little bit louder and and and wake him up. You know, aren't you glad you serve a God 24 hours a day, 7 days a week? He never goes to sleep. He's always present to bless and to heal, to answer prayer and to do great and mighty things. Friend, you have a God that loves you and wants to help you. Why don't you give your whole life to him, your whole heart to him? How long are we going to try to ride the fence?

Well, that's what the prophets of Baal were doing. So after Elijah chided them a little bit, they noon came, God, their God Baal hadn't answered. So they began to scream and loud, get louder and they even cut themselves and blood gushed on their altar and they carried on until late in the afternoon. They were just worn out. So then Elijah said, now it's God's turn. Let's give God an opportunity, the almighty Jehovah. And the fire of God came down. God began to bless. Friend, listen, when you're right with God, God's always there. When you're not right with God, he's there too, but you don't know he's there.

You don't feel he's there, so you don't have his joy or his blessing, but he always sees us. He's never far from any of us. He's right there with you now where you are. You're in church and you're in this pew. You're hearing this message. God is here. God is here and God is here to do something good and to bless. Jesus said, God sees the sparrow. Let me read the scripture. Luke 12 6. Are not five sparrows sold for two half pennies and not one of them is forgotten? Not one of them. And then he goes on to tell us how much more valuable we are than the sparrows.

We are valuable. Hey, I want you to turn to your neighbor on your left and then turn to your neighbor on the right and say God values you. Come on, do that now. Were you going to remember that? God values you. Look at the detailed care of God in our lives. Friend, if we were to give God our all really give him our heart, not just say I gave my heart to the Lord. I mean but to give him our all, he would open the windows of heaven. He would change the direction of your life.

He would bring so much good, so many blessings. Now, we'll do it for a little while and because it doesn't happen in the next three days, we say well, you know, I better go back to my old thing and my old way and we give up. We turn. God wants to see how sincere you are. We can look at Jesus and see how sincere he is, how sincere he was, how far he went to get our hearts. He went all the way to Calvary. So you have God's attention. Even the little sparrows has God's attention.

You have always had God's attention. Now, from the day you were born, when you came into this world from your mother's womb, God loved you. He cared for you. He had a plan and a purpose for your life. And friend, if we'll only get in touch and get in in stride with God, God has a has a march or a beat and if we will know that beat or that purpose and get in stride with it and flow with God, we do a little bit and then we'll resist. We'll do a little bit and then we'll do what we know that he does not approve of.

We know it. We know it at the moment. Then we feel guilty about it afterwards and then we'll try to serve God just a little bit for the next three or four days or the next Sunday and then back to the old way again. Friend, we're not doing very much better than the prophets of Baal. And Elijah is saying, listen, listen, if God's God and if his word is the truth, then obey it, live for him, serve him, love him, honor him. And the blessing of God will come in great measure, more than you can even gather and enjoy the blessing of God will come.

God had a plan. He had a purpose for you. How long, dear friends, how long are you going to keep kicking against the pricks and and keep resisting that purpose that God has for your life? Let him have his way. Let him have his way and he'll bring his good into your life. Well, there you were, just a tiny little baby coming into the world. God saw you. He loved you and then he breathed the breath of life into you. You became a living soul. God says, oh, I hope she grows up to be the persons, the woman I want her to be.

I hope he grows up to follow me and be the man I want him to be because I have a plan for his life. And if he gets in touch with that plan, if she gets in touch with that plan, and friend, listen to me, it's never too late to get in touch with God's plan for your life. Never too late. Today is the day of salvation. Now's the accepted time. Trust in the Lord. And then that was when you were born. And then when you were born again, when you really accepted Jesus as your personal Lord and savior, he breathed again on you the second time, but this time he breathed the Holy Spirit upon you, the Holy Spirit into you.

He breathed into your very being, the power and presence of Jesus. Present friends, don't Jesus is in your heart. Don't take Jesus places that he doesn't want to go. Don't take him places. Don't get involved with people that don't like Jesus, that don't serve Jesus and make friends of the ungodly. They'll pull you down. They're not going to lift lift you up and you're not going to be able to lift them up because they don't want to be lifted up. They already know what they have chosen. Friend, choose God. Walk with the Lord. Let the Lord bless you.

But listen again, don't take Jesus places that Jesus doesn't want to go. Your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. Don't link your body up with some ungodly rebellious God resisting. Yes, even God hating because if they didn't hate God, they would love God. Either we are for God or we're against God. Come on, if God be God, serve him. If Baal be Baal, then serve Baal. But make up your mind. God's already made up his mind. Make up your mind. Let Let us make up our mind that that God is the one. He's the one.

Now, can a mother forget the babe at her breast, the child that she bore? Well, it's unlikely, but sometimes that does happen. God says that baby so. It can happen. Once in a great while it does happen. A mother does forget the child at her breast, but he says this, I will not forget you. I will not. Isn't that a wonderful promise? I will not forget you. So you have God's attention. You have always had God's attention and friend, you always will have God's attention. He says in Hebrews 13 5, never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.

Come on, can you say that never will I leave you?

Guest (Male): Never will I leave you. Never will I forsake you.

Pastor Jack Morris: Never, never, never. Friend, God doesn't let people down, but people let God down. But God says never will I leave you. Now, in the very first part of that verse, see that's the part of the verse that we love. We love that part of Hebrews 13 5. It's the it's all in one verse. The very first part of that verse five says be content. Be content with where you are, with what you have. People says, how can I be content where I live, what I'm going through, what I'm experiencing, my circumstances? How can I be content?

Friend, Jesus says never will I leave you, never will I forsake you. That's how you can be content. An awareness of the presence of God will make you content wherever you are. Whatever your condition, you can be content if you are aware God is there and he wants to make you aware of his holy and divine presence. Be content. If you have an active faith if if you have a faith that will cause you to be aware of God, then then you can be content, but you cannot be content if you're not aware of God 's presence.

And God is not going to go to and and bless and bring answers to prayer, healing of circumstances unless we are aware that he's there in order to do that. Now, life is is stressful. Life will take us places we we don't really want to go or things that we really don't want to experience. Sometimes it's not the big things in life that's getting us down. It it's not the the great gigantic things that come upon us like a a marriage failure, a death of a loved one, a financial setback, a foreclosure, the loss of a friend.

These these huge big things. Sometimes it's just the everyday wear and tear of life would just wear you down, cause you to become distracted, get your attention off of Jesus. That's called stress. Now, when stress begins to wear and tear you down physically and it it works its way into your spirit, into your consciousness, then it becomes what is known as distress. There's stress and then there's distress. Life is hectic and now the hectic has gotten inside of us. We've got hectic in here. We've got distress in our emotions and in our bodies and this is causing us to drift from God.

Yes, big circumstances come that will cause us to go through tribulation, trial, big problems, but now what about those just everyday wear you out just trying to keep a breast, to keep up? It it becomes so stressful just trying to live life. You know what I'm talking about? And how that will hurt you and bring you down. It'll you stress is a terrible thing if we let it and manage us and we don't manage it. It will break down the body's immune system, but what I'm talking about is it's going to break down your spiritual immune system.

And then temptation comes in. Difficulties will cause you to have that feeling that God has forgotten me, that God is absent from me, that that God doesn't love me anymore, that God doesn't know where I am. He doesn't know what I'm going through. Friend, those thoughts are not the thoughts of the Holy Spirit. They're your thoughts. Don't think those thoughts. Think that this, never will I leave you, never will I forsake you. Come on, say it again. Never

Guest (Male): Never will I leave you. Never will I

Pastor Jack Morris: Okay, there it is on the screen. Read the whole part of verse five. Come on. Be content with what you have because God has said never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.

Guest (Male): Be content with what you have because God has said never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.

Pastor Jack Morris: There are some things in our life that are even good things, but it's taking all of our time, all of our attention. We don't have time to worship and to do and even to serve God. We have to look at our agenda and say I'll get back to you. We just don't have time. There all of our time is being taken up. We live in a very hectic place. You know, life is a thief. Life will do this. Life is a taker and life is sapping God's people, just taking the energy out of them and not only sapping the energy out of them, it's taking the spirituality out of them.

Life is working on us, you and me. It's working on us. It's doing these things, but Jesus says the thief comes not but for to steal, to kill and to destroy. And that's life. That's exactly what the enemy wants to do to you. That's exactly what life is doing to you. It is stealing your joy, stealing your personality, destroying your walk with God. If you'll let it, the world calls it stress. Psychologists and psychiatrists and the counselors get together and they have courses called stress management. Friend, the stress management is knowing Jesus and being filled with the spirit of Jesus Christ.

Amen. Jesus says the the world comes the thief comes to take away, to steal, to destroy, to take away. But he says, listen, oh my God in Jesus name, listen. Jesus said, I have come that you might have life and have it abundantly. The world will take your life and make an old man or an old woman and then finally it'll take it all together and you'll die. But Jesus comes who is resurrection and life to give you abundant life in this life and in the world to come eternal life. Jesus is life evermore, life evermore, life everlasting.

This is what he offers you. Friend, anybody in their logical right mind would say no to the world, no to sin and yes to Jesus and accept him and love him and live for him. This is what the Lord Jesus does. He gives peace. He gives peace. Jesus says my peace I give unto you, my peace not as the world gives, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled. Some of us today are saying God, where is that peace? Where is that peace? Friend, turn your face toward Jesus today. Turn your face toward spirituality.

Confess to him that you have drifted away. Confess, acknowledge and say God, I have let you down, but you've never let me down. Friend, you do that, God will throw his arms around you. He'll kiss you back into his kingdom. He will bless you and you will know an overflowing abundance of joy and happiness in your life. And when you do that, don't just let it go for three days, but day after day read your Bible, pray, fellowship with God's people, know the blessing of God derived from them and impart to them your people. God's presence is sufficient for peace.

Peace will come and push out that stress and push out that tiredness and bring in that new life. Peace will come. The presence of God will give it. God's presence will give and take care of the necessities of life. God will supply his promise of his presence is perpetual. Now, notice what he says. Never will I leave you. He says I will never leave you. I will never relax my hold on you. I will never let you go. Friend, what he is promising you, you turn it around, you promise and do it back to him.

I'll tell you you have a tight relationship with the Lord that the world, the devil, hell itself can't pry it away. That wonderful relationship. Like the song says, oh love that will not let me go. I rest my weary soul in you. Rest your soul in Jesus today. Today is the day of salvation. This is the day the Lord has made for you to come to him and experience his power and his presence. Once you know his presence, old things pass away, new things come. God bless you as we bow now before him to receive his blessing.

Some of us need to talk to him about some things today, real serious talk with the Lord. Let's bow in his presence.

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