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: All that the world has to offer you is negativism. Jesus has life to offer you. You can be born again.

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: Before I begin the message, I want to tell you just a little bit of the background that brought me to this place where I'm going to the book of Exodus, and I will be in the book of Exodus for weeks, maybe months, maybe just a few weeks. I'm not sure just how the Holy Spirit is working and leading. But while I was praying in my private devotions, just reading through the Bible, I thought I'd get a good jump on it this year and I'd read ahead and be ready. I like to read the Bible through every year, but I never read it through every year.

I always don't get through it, but it takes me a little longer usually. So I thought I'll get a jump on it this year and I read through exit through a Genesis and then through Exodus. And while I was reading Exodus, I felt the Holy Spirit in a strange and new way. There were words, phrases, sentences, a whole passages that the Holy Spirit began to highlight and they just came off to me. And I rejoiced in the Lord as I heard the Holy Spirit speaking these words to me. I was reading them and yet I was hearing them.

And then the Holy Spirit and I've I've felt this before. Then the Holy Spirit, I knew what was going to happen. He said I want you to take this message to your congregation. I want you to take this to my people, the Largo Community Church. The word Exodus means exit, a going out, a departure. And it seemed to me that the Holy Spirit was saying there's going to be a liberation to many people this year that he's going to cause people to leave behind burdens and cares and difficulties, things that have hindered and bound them.

There's going to be an Exodus, a freedom, a liberation. And I continue to look to the Lord and pray to his will to be done. And then I begin to feel inferior. I thought, Lord, what you have been showing me, can I actually truly, in all reality, bring that and make it relevant? Because Exodus is the history of Israel and all of the miracles of God to those people in liberating them and setting them free. But to make it relevant today to you and me and then I thought, well, you know, when Moses was called of God to lead the Exodus, he felt a little bit inadequate.

And then the Lord spoke to me again real quick. He came real fast this time. That was my thought. Now here comes his thought. He said Moses had to live it. All you have to do is tell it. So why should you be a concerned? You just tell what's there. And I said, okay, Lord, I'm going to do it. I'm going to tell what's there. I believe we're going to see, as Israel did, new and strange things this year. When Moses went to the burning bush and God was speaking to him, he turned aside to see this quote strange sight.

The Lord was saying that there's going to be new things, strange things, strange in not that they're they're going to be fearful or we're going to wonder at them in a negative way, but strange and that they're going to be new experiences, things that we have never experienced before, much like Moses experiencing the burning bush. Never had he experienced anything like that before. It was a strange thing. So friends, expect strange things to happen to you today and this year. God's going to do it. It's going to be wonderful things in that there are going to be blessings, marvelous, astonishing, unusually good things.

Now I don't think I could conjure this up myself. I I don't think so. I believe the Holy Spirit told me what he's going to do. And now it's up to you to hear and receive the blessing that God has. Will you receive it?

Guest (Male): Yes.

Pastor Jack Morris: Amen. He's going to bless and he's going to do great and thing mighty things. But the reason I begin to feel somewhat inferior to this and the inferiority or the inadequacy was making it relevant. You see, there were the the plagues to soften up Pharaoh's heart, to cause Pharaoh to get to the place where he would say, okay, I'm going to let these people go. Pharaoh had them bound. There were all those plagues. The last plague being the blood on the door post when the death angel passed through the land of Egypt and the first born that of every family that didn't have blood on the door post, the first born died.

Then there's the crossing of the Red Sea. How am I going to make that relevant? We're not going to go out and cross the Chesapeake Bay. There's a bridge there for us, right? The crossing of the Red Sea. And then the enemies, there were so many enemies that they had to attack or attack them, the people of Israel, and they moved through on toward the land that flows with milk and honey. God had a blessing out there for them. God was blessing them while they were going to a blessing. Then there was the manna in the wilderness.

God began to provide provisions for them. There wasn't anything to eat and God sent the food from heaven. There wasn't anything to drink. God brought water out of the rock. God sent the Ten Commandments. God built the tabernacle, told them how to build the tabernacle, how to build the the ark of the covenant. There was a pillar of fire by night that led them. There was a pillar of of cloud by day that led them. And I thought of all of those miracles and I thought, my, one miracle after another. And I'm to bring those miracles and make them relevant to a 21st century people, believers.

There were miracles in the atmosphere, in the elements. They saw miracles. There were miracles of healing, of sickness and diseases. There were the defeating of enemies. There were the provisions of the manna and the water. There was guidance. You see, Israel had been in slavery. They had suffered hundreds of years in slavery. They had been there building cities for the Egyptians. The Egyptians were getting rich off of this free labor that they had. But God heard their cry and God was doing something to liberate them and he did indeed liberate them. Now here's how it all happened.

70 people went down into Egypt. 70 Israelites went down. Jacob and his family totaling 70 peoples. There was a famine in the land of Canaan and the people were starving. The Israelites were starving. And they but there was blessing in Egypt. There was much grain. And so the Israelites decided to go down into Egypt. Joseph, Jacob's son, was there, the prime minister of Egypt. And he welcomed his father to come down and to bring the rest of the family. Now Jacob was the one that God changed his name from Jacob to Israel. Now you know you've heard Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

You've heard those three, right? Abraham was the one that that accepted the covenant of God by faith. He had a son named Isaac. Isaac then had a son named Jacob. Jacob wrestled with the Lord seeking the blessing of God. God touched his thigh. He was crippled for the rest of his life, but God changed his name to Israel. And that's where Israel got its name from one man wrestling with God. The blessing of God's came upon Israel. So Jacob or Israel, 70 people go down into Egypt. Now when they left Egypt, nearly 3 million left.

You talk about a a prolific people. Wow. From 70 to 3 million. But when they went down into Egypt, Pharaoh and the Egyptians were favorable toward them. They accepted them. They welcomed them. They gave them the best grazing land. But after the passing of years, new Pharaohs came to the throne. Pharaoh is another synonym for king. And they forgot about the blessing that the Israelites brought to them. And they became in the Israelites the Egyptians became intimidated intimidated by these people who who were growing in number. And so Pharaoh instigated this institution of slavery to bring them into subjection because the they were Israelites were growing so fast and the Egyptians became intimidated by them.

Slavery was a terrible institution. Do you know I am I am told there are more slaves in the world today than at any other time in history. That that is awesome, isn't it? That one human would own another human. And we're all made in the likeness and the image of God. That that is that is an awesome thing. But I'm going to read to you the condition of slavery that is described in the book of Exodus. Cruel, harsh. Okay, here it is. It's on the screen. Read it with me. Pharaoh put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labor, worked them ruthlessly, made their lives bitter with hard labor.

Guest (Male): We will return for the conclusion of today message following this important update on how you can make a difference in lives across the world by supporting the Healing Word Ministry.

Guest (Female): Would you consider partnering with Pastor Morris and supporting the Healing Word Ministry with your prayers and donating to keep the gospel of Jesus Christ reaching thousands? Go to the healingword.com and click the donate button to pledge your support. And remember, the faith building message you heard today is our gift to you. Your donation is your gift to God.

Guest (Male): Now let's join Pastor Jack Morris for the conclusion of today 's message.

Pastor Jack Morris: Slavery as an institution, let me just depart from their slavery, the the Hebrews slavery under Pharaoh and the Egyptians. Let me just depart from that and and talk about slavery for just a moment. Slavery as an institution didn't come along until about 1607 in Virginia for African Americans, for Africans. Slavery as an institution goes all the way back to even before recording of human history. There's some hints that slavery existed that by some ancient Babylonian writings, just some hints. But it has been in existence for hundreds or millions of years. But it came to the United States about 1607 thereabouts when tens of thousands of Africans were brought into the United States.

And people, the same thing happened. Became rich. Free labor. You still with me?

Guest (Male): Amen.

Pastor Jack Morris: Oh, you got real quiet here all of a sudden. You more likely know this story better than I do. It was a it was a harsh, cruel, ruthless, bitter situation that the American Africans were experienced. Now it lasted as a legal institution. Slavery lasted as a legal institution here in the United States until the 13th Amendment of the US Constitution in somewhere around 1867. But slavery was was difficult. It is always difficult. One human being owning another human being. It's it's never intended to be that way. It 's an aberration of anything that God ever intended to be.

But those Africans here in America began to pray. Now they they had their own religion in Africa, idol worshippers, heathen religions. But they started turning to Christ. Somehow they began to experience Jesus, a living religion, just like I did when I accepted Jesus as my own personal. I found a living Christ to the one that would bless me. And those Africans that here in Virginia and in the United States, they would work in the cotton fields and sing those songs that they would compose even while they were out there picking cotton. And they were songs of victory.

But they also incorporated words that described how ruthless and how bitter their lives were. But they would always end with victory. They always believed that somehow God was going to see their problems, see their difficulty and liberate them. And they kept praying, they kept believing, they kept singing. Now I don't know whether that that's song what is it? Kumbaya. I don't know whether they sang that in the cotton fields or not. I don't know John when that song was written. But at any rate, if they didn't sing it, that spirit of Kumbaya, come by here, my Lord, come by here.

And God saw their pain and God honored their faith and God brought blessing to them. Some of your ancestors, some of you can trace some of your ancestry back to that time. Those their ones now have gone on to glory and are now in the presence of God praying for their extended family or for posterity. But I want to tell you about a greater slavery. It's a slavery of the mind. It's a slavery of the spirit, a slavery of the soul. That's a greater slavery than the slavery of the body. Now some of our ancestors, your ancestors, mine, I don't know, but what the history was.

But we're all one in Christ now and we're all going to support and love one another. Can you say amen? Amen. They were praying and they were believing God. They were enslaved physically. But those slaves down in Virginia and in those southern states were never enslaved mentally. Their minds were free to believe on the God that brought his son into the world and the God who took their sins and took those sins to the cross and they rejoiced in that savior that they knew. Their bodies were in slavery, but their minds were not. Now the generations have come and gone.

Things have changed dramatically. Today our bodies are not in slavery, but our minds and our spirits to a great extent are in slavery. And God wants to liberate you and me from that kind of bondage and that kind of slavery that we continue to bow down to and give us a free victory living in Christ. This is God's gift to us. And when we pray to him, he will bless us. Now some are enslaved by an unforgiving spirit. They wish they could forgive that person who hurt them and did them wrong, but they they they feel a bitterness toward that person and it haunts them.

They can't even worship the way they would want to worship because of that bitter spirit. Now you say I I'm not a slave. No. Yes. Think about it. You the thing that you say that you're not going to do anymore for a while, it works. But sooner or later, that feeling of bitterness comes back again. And you behave according to that feeling of bitterness. That fear will come back again and you will behave in fearful ways. Those those feelings, those fears that are enslaving you, but God wants to free us. He wants to liberate us.

When we look to him, he will do that. We are a people of God and we need to remember who we are and that's why God liberated the Egyptian the the Hebrews who were in Egypt. They remembered the covenant that God had made with Abraham. God made a covenant with Abraham that he would bless Abraham's seed, that he would make his seed as the stars of the heaven and as the dust of the earth, that God was going to come through. That was one man. He believed and God came through and God blessed. Now God always comes through.

And he wants to come through with for you today. He wants to come through and bless you today. What is it that that's holding you down, holding you back, uh causing you to to withdraw? Uh what what is it? I don't know what it is, uh but you do. Let the Lord reveal himself to you. Let him show you that you are under his covenant blessing and your mind and your thoughts do not have to hinder you or slow you down or keep you down. God wants you to rise up and be free and liberated in him and know victory and know Hallelujah.

This is God's blessing to you. There's the slavery of the soul. I want you to look at the screen and read John 8:34. In unison, Jesus replied, I tell you the truth. Everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the son sets you free, you will be free indeed. Hey, did you do you know what you just read? Do you believe that? Notice Jesus replied. Jesus is speaking. He's the Jesus that you accepted so long ago and some of you are going to accept him today, perhaps for the very first time.

Jesus is talking. Everyone, everyone, everyone. That's you and me. That includes us. Everyone. You see, sin is not confined to a nation, a nationality, a culture. Sin has captured all of us. And so have these temptations and these habits and these things that hinder us, these things that we don't like about ourselves. Friend, you can begin liking yourself as much as Jesus likes you when you turn to Jesus and allow him. Notice everyone who sins is a slave to sin. We keep bowing down to those evil habits, those unclean habits. We keep going back to it again.

We think we're free only to be participating in it again. Now a slave has no permanent a slave has no permanent place. The slaves in Egypt had no claims on Egypt. The the Africans had no claims on America heritage as long as they were a slave. There's no permanent place for a slave. No permanent place at all. That this that has captured our minds, our spirits, our emotions does is is not going to cause us to feel the security and the permanence that we should have. That's why there is so much fear and insecurity. A slave has no permanent place in the family, but listen to this, but a son belongs.

And God has caused each of us, male and female, to enter in to sonship privileges. But a son belongs. How long? Forever. Your salvation, your liberation when it all comes from Jesus, it'll be forever. You try to fix it and fix your own life yourself. It'll be temporary. It won't last. But with Jesus, it will last. Your blessing will last forever. Can you say amen?

Guest (Male): Amen.

Pastor Jack Morris: This is God blessing to the people who will believe and trust him and accept his covenant blessing. Now someone said sometime ago, uh it was a a pastor. He he he didn't tell much about his life. I don't know much about him at all. But I know that he had difficulties as a boy growing up in the family. Uh this I'm talking about a Caucasian pastor. And he said he said, my first birth brought me nothing but heartache and suffering. He said, my parents honored my sister, appreciated my sister. They they showed it. And and they I was I was second rate in my family.

He said, my first birth, he said, brought me nothing but just heartache and shame. But he said something happened. I found out something. I found out that I can have a second birth. Jesus told me I could be born again. And this man turned to the Lord and he accepted Jesus as his personal Lord and savior. Now the good news is this, dear friend, if you don't like the the how you were in your first birth, this the predispositions that have come in, predispositions to anger. Some people have carried from their family feelings of anger.

Their father showed anger, expressed anger. Now the son has grown up to express anger and behave just like the father. The the father or the mother an alcoholic, they grew up. They're now following that that same example. These these predispositions, we don't like these things about ourselves, unforgiving spirits, feelings of prejudice, whatever it is that it is negative. All that the world has to offer you is negativism. Jesus has life to offer you. And you can be born again. You can be born with a predisposition of the savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. You can be born with a heart that will reach out in love and embrace all people because Jesus embraces you.

He will embrace you today and bless you and abundantly bless you. You see, the scripture says, if the son sets you free, you shall be free indeed. You can't free yourself, but there's one who can free you. He can change your life. You can be born again into the kingdom of God. You can become that new person. You can begin to like yourself again because he likes you. He loves you. He gave himself for you.

Guest (Male): Do you need Pastor Morris to pray with you about a struggle or decision you're wrestling with? The pray now app is available to you right now. Go to the healingword.com. Click pray now and select the topic that matches your request. Pastor Morris will provide encouragement, pray with you and deliver a brief message on overcoming and living in victory. I also invite you to check out all the ministry resources available for you at the healingword.com. There you can search and listen to messages that match your need and send your prayer request directly to the pastor and he will pray for you and return an encouraging note.

You'll find all these gifts waiting for you at the healingword.com. Join us tomorrow for another healing word message. Until then, blessings on you.