Running on Empty

I'm riding the shadow, you win everybody Nothing can stand against the power of our With my hands that be right, gone to you Every year I'll be a glory, I'll be through the fire The same God that never fails, will not fail me Now, in no way, the same God who's never left Is working on things out, you're working on things If you hide, you'll always find me Yeah, so you'll replace your day But it's heavy, oh, yeah, time will The same God that never failed, will not fail me Now, in no way, working on things, oh, yeah So, praise this morning, church, you may be seated for just a moment Well, good morning, you may be giving yourself another hand for being here in the rain and the cold You woke up this morning and said, you know what, it's cold, it's rainy But am I going to go to the still worship, Lord, and what did you answer? Yes, I will, amen? Good deal. So glad that you're here for the first time in a long time You are our VIPs and if you didn't feel like one of those blue cards when you came in Make sure you stop by that VIP area when you wait, I'll grab one from the seat in front of you We've got a special gift for you, just want to say thank you for worshiping with us today Also, Pastor Dale will be there after service He'd love to meet you and just say thank you again personally for myself I just want to say we've got a lot of great things happening It's a great time to be a new letter, a lot of classes getting ready to start Real soon, we've got a marriage class starting We've got Church 101 next month, we've got Celebrate Recovery You can go to Connectedess, sign up for that if you want We've got Baby Dedication, I think next week or week after We've got Baptism coming up, we've got all kinds of stuff happening So if you want to get involved, you want to take that next step, go to the Connectedess They can answer any questions that you may have I'm excited for today, we are just getting started with our worship Pastor Dale has a great message for you and I'm just believing that God's going to move in a way And I'll tell you a thing I love about rainy days, guys, I told our volunteers our little huddle that we have Before service, I said, man, I love rainy days because we get to see The hands and feet of Jesus in action with those guys out there with the umbrellas Getting people in and out, y'all getting my hand doing it And so I'm excited about that, looking forward to what God's going to do today I think He's going to reward us for showing up and worshiping Not because we deserve it, because He does, amen So we're just going to pour out everything that we have I want to say this, we couldn't do any of the ministry that we do here at this church If you want for your effect for this to give, we can and we can and I just want to encourage you If you're not a part of what's going on here, if you're not a part of the mission, if you're not given I would challenge you to give and just try God out This is the one spot in the Bible where God says, hey, test me See if you can out give me and if you'll get a part of this mission I believe you'll be shot by the results that God gives And you can see that ministry is taking place all over this county, all over this Really this four to three region that we minister to and all over the world Because of your faithfulness to give, we can and we can also say thank you, thank you, thank you For your faithfulness in all kinds of ways that you can give me a part of that Well, right now I'm ready to worship a little bit more, go ahead and stay back to you, let's get ready to worship Because here's what we're getting ready to sing a song, I love this song Because, hey, it's just awesome lyrics, it's just awesome lyrics, it's just about God turning graves into gardens It's just about making rivers into deserts and highways where there's no way And it just talks about a great God, nothing like it's a lot, it's a really cool one to sing I can just be honest with you, that look really good And man, I get excited because every bit of that is worship We come here and some of you have to sit beside you and you sing great Some of you, well, some of you love the Lord, I can tell that, okay?

But here's what I can tell you, it's in God's sight, it's all the same He's looking for that praise, and some of you, by lifting your hands, your praise, maybe you can't sing a lick, so you just hum and lift your hands Maybe you just clap your hands to the beat, maybe you just bounce up and down, maybe you do it through the... We got guys worshiping back there through our media ministry running cameras and making sure that it looks good, our light ministry, our drums, our bass, piano, all that stuff is worship, and the reason we do that is because we serve a God that can turn graves in the guards So can we just practice a little bit of worship this morning? Can you put your hands together, let's make some noise for the Lord, it's worthy to be worship? Well I searched the world, but it couldn't feel me, and man's in peace, and dress with faith, or never enough And then you came along, and he backed together, and every desire is now satisfied, and hear him love Come on church, sing with me Well there's nothing better than God afraid, to show you my weakness, and my failures are more than you still call me freedom Because you got of me, he's a God of the fine, and grace won't give gain This is where we need you out here church, you ready?

You turn morning to dancing, you give beauty for ashes, you turn shame into glory, you're the only You turn morning to dancing, ashes, you turn shame into glory, you're the only You turn grace into fire, you turn bones into army, you turn stings into highways, you're the only You turn stings into highways, you turn stings into highways, you turn stings I started singing that song, I was thinking, what's better, what's better than Jesus? What will be better today, than you leave here with a relationship with him? So listen, a man that Pastor Gels won't come up here, and he's going to give you a great word, but can I tell you something, you don't have to wait for that? If you want to know the goodness that we're singing about, if you want to know that God that can turn seas into highways, now is your opportunity Don't wait, turn to him now, now is your opportunity, so we're going to sing another song, and I know some of you right now, you're at a place where I want to believe, I want to trust you, I want to trust God, I want to give my life to him, but I don't know that I've got what it takes, but that's okay Because that's just exactly what happens in the Bible over and over again, people would begin to follow him and then something would happen, and they're like, well I don't know One of his top man Peter is the son of God, I'll do you, I'll follow you wherever you go, I'll never forsake you three times he denies him And then the song we're getting ready to sing, help my unbelief, this Father goes to Jesus, he says, my son is sick, he's throwing himself in the fire, he's demon pizzazzed, I don't know what to do, Jesus says Hey, if you'll believe, then all things are possible, and in the most honest prayer, an entire Bible in my opinion, other than one's by Jesus, he says, Lord I believe, but help my unbelief And maybe that's where you're at right now today, you're at a place where you want to believe, but you just have something that just isn't making it all the way from here to here, well don't wait, maybe you're praying for somebody that's sick, maybe they need to touch from God, you know that the God that we serve is able to heal him and deliver him, but you just can't see him, but it's all the top of it for you today As we sing this song, whatever it is, maybe you got to love one that's gone wayward, maybe they need Jesus and you can know that he's able to save him, but you're not seeing it today, this order is open, as we sing this song, maybe you believe, but you need God to help you with your unbelief, will you come lay it down in his feet as we sing?

If I'm asking you to stop, I'm not going to do the school. How much Christ is ever followed? We just thank you for this day. We thank you for writing your Lord.

We need rain. We need blessings of your rain, Lord. We ask for protection and guidance for us. We ask for this congregation to open their hearts and ears of minds to your word.

And we just ask for a great word from this pastor, Lord. Put your anointing on Him. May He lead somebody to you today, Lord. Bless everything we do.

In your name we pray. Amen. My name is Jessica and I'm a great believer in Jesus Christ. I struggle with Brian, God of the Pandit Sea, people blazing, shame and guilt from my past, unforgiveness and security.

Some of that I've been delivered from, some of you I still struggle with. About a year ago I was invited to see our through a friend of mine. I didn't exactly know what CR was, but I quickly learned as a Christ in the ministry that equips people with the resources and relationships to find a new way of living. It is for all her habits and hangouts that she was dealing with regardless if it's in the prison or in the past.

So I started going to CR not exactly knowing what it was, but I knew at the time that my life needed a change and I was ready to make a change. So I jumped into it. About a month after attending CR I decided to join what we call the 12-State program. 12-State program is a deeper dive into CR that just goes more into the materials of what exactly CR is.

So joining 12-State I was super nervous. I had 12-14 women in the class and I didn't know how I was going to deal all of the horrible parts of my past and for all these women. But after the first meeting I quickly realized that people in there had the same issues I had or had done some of the same things I had done and I wasn't the only person who had missed up in life. One of the stumbling blocks in Inter and 12-State was my pride, but I quickly realized that pride doesn't have a place in delivery recovery.

12-State is once a week meetings with homework in between and the homework is really what gets you and makes you dive deep into your issues, your hurts, your habits and really bring them up. Some of them don't even realize you have and that was my situation. I had some issues that I didn't realize I had and in going through 12-State I actually was able to dig them up, deal with them, heal from them and do away with some hurt, bitterness and grudges that I was holding. Celebrate recovery is not only for drugs and alcohol which most people try to make it think or think that that's what it's about.

It's actually for all habits and hang ups. I've never tried a drug and I don't drink so that was not my issue going into CR. I actually didn't think that I had the issues that I had until I completed a 12-State and realized that I did have more hurts and habits than I thought I had. Confessing your hurt, habits and hang ups to God and surrendering to Him and letting Him deal with it is the only way that you're going to get your healing.

Celebrate recovery cannot heal you only God can but it can give you the resources and the relationships and the community to help guide you. So if you're dealing with anything, any hurt from the past, the present, any habit, any hang up, it is for you. It's not for the perfect people. There's no perfect people in Celebrate Recovery.

That's the great part is we're all broken. Everybody in Celebrate Recovery is broken some way, somehow and it's just a really good community of people that come together to celebrate Jesus and to talk about God and how He's delivered us from our hurts, habits and hang ups. I want to encourage everyone to give CR a try even if you don't think you need it. There's a lot of people out there who are think they're perfect and in and out of their issues.

It's for those too. Thank you for letting me share. Yeah, give her a hand. Yeah.

Good morning. Good to see you. Good to see you. Hope you're doing alright.

Thank you for coming out and fighting the weather this morning. You could have just stayed right where you were but I'm thankful you came out to be with us today. I want to cover a couple of things. Number one, deeper dive on Tuesday night, seven o'clock.

They'll have to Facebook. The reason you want to go there is because we can't cover everything in the sermons on Sunday morning and an hour and a half. I just want to see if you're listening. But we'll dive deeper into it on Tuesday night.

If you want to do that, I would encourage you to go back to Tuesday night and understand how storms work in your life and what God is trying to do there. It'd be a great opportunity for you. Pastor Bob has a Bible study on Wednesday night at the Connect Center downtown. You want to be a part of that?

He's going through the book of Hebrew. I think you'll like that. He's a good Bible teacher. Make sure you take advantage of that.

Let's do this. Let's thank Jessica for her testimony and what she did there. Yeah. They don't know you love her.

Yeah. She's a part of the Celebrate Recovery team. They've all been to train in Tennessee and they've been through CR and we're going to try to build this minister downtown at the Connect Center. You can go outside there to the right.

Someone should be at that table. If you're interested in CR and if you have a hang up or something that you want God to help you with, and it doesn't have to be extreme, it can be a small. Remember last week, if it's big to you, it's big to God, he'll help you with all that. So make sure you are a part of that.

I want to give thanks now to one of our county commissioners who is so faithful to be here, Charles Ray. He's working out with the county. They're providing the resources for Celebrate Recovery, not the church. They're doing that.

Give them a hand. Thank you, Charles Ray, for all you're doing there. So we're going to jump into this sermon. Let's do this first.

Let's welcome the Radio and Internet Ministry. I left them out a couple of weeks now. Let them know. You love them.

Yeah. We're going to talk about the current series called Thrive, and I want to tell you what Thrive is all about. Thrive is a call to rise above surviving and step into life. The life God created us to live.

Here it is right here. Now don't miss these points, strengthen by his presence, anchor in Jesus and his finished work, renewed for each day and surrounded by the right people. Isn't that good? And Celebrate Recovery, by the way, for some of you would be the right people to help you move beyond where you are.

So there's something for everybody. Make sure you are a part of that. We talked about the first week, how to have a fresh start. We've covered that pretty well.

We talked about storms last week, the storms whisper, and what you can learn about storms here again, we went deeper with that on Tuesday night. If you want to go back and watch that. So, how many of you know when you go through a storm and things are not good, you kind of get worn out, right? How many of you know life can wear you out?

How many of you understand that? So with that said, you come out of storms and you're kind of in a bad way, and even in life if you don't go through a big storm, I want to talk about running on empty. I want to talk about how do we recover from some of the things that we go through? How do we live this life because a lot of people are tired?

Now let me ask you a question. How many of you would admit this morning that you are emotionally exhausted right now? You've been through something, you've been dealing with you. I thought we would be in the right place.

Not only emotionally, you can be spiritually exhausted and mentally worn out, right? It can happen. Now how many of you in my talk with you already? So I know I'm in the right place.

Get your hand up. Let me say, okay, buckle up. We're going to hear what God has to say about this because it's a real deal. It happens to everybody.

So when you think about that, I want you to think about this statement right here. God gives the strength you need for the day you're in, not the day you're afraid of. Now here's why this is important. All of us are going to go through stuff.

We're going to live life and life is very difficult. And I want you to understand that God's immerses are made new every morning. Every morning, God does something special in your life. So understand it this way.

God doesn't want you to waste your resources on what may happen in the future. It doesn't want you to waste your resources on what could happen the next day, the next week or whatever. God wants you to focus on today because he's supplying whatever you need for today. So when you think about that and you understand what we're talking about, this running on empty, I want to give you a few things that you need to know, real basic things so you can live the life that God's called you live and get yourself out of this dilemma you're in because you're so exhausted in a lot of areas of your life.

And so when you think about that, the first thing I want you to see is this. When you're running on empty, remember everybody gets tired. You say to me, we'll preach to that for a second. We know everybody gets tired, but we don't act like everybody gets tired, right?

We never do that. How many of you are like me? Four or five years, I've been battling a sickness and I'm 90% better, maybe 85% better than I ever was. Thank God.

I give you praise and go for that. But how many of you are like me when you go through a bad situation and you're battling something and you can't figure it out, how many of you begin to question God? Anybody in the house? How many of you begin to criticize yourself?

And here's what we have a tendency to do. We'll look at other people, our age or what I have a bad problem. I look at people older than me and I say, my goodness, what's wrong with you? Look at what they're doing and look at what they're accomplishing and looking at how things are going for them.

What in the world is wrong with you? You're not supposed to be here sick like this and going through all this you weak pitiful thing. You all over talking yourself that way. You only get in the mirror sometime and just talk to yourself that way.

You'll get mad at yourself and argue with yourself. You all don't do that. If you start answering yourself, you got problems. So go to the mirror and look and then you can talk back to yourself.

And so we do that and I've been guilty of that myself and when we get in the self-time, we like to compare ourselves to other people. The reason we need to know that everybody gets tired is simply this. It normalizes our fatigue and it normalizes us getting tired and it reduces the criticism in our life. We can criticize ourselves most and then if we don't do it enough, how many of you know that there's a devil or a demon that will sit on your shoulder and try to tear you down and wear you out?

When you have a little problem they'll get there and they'll, I mean it's one thing right behind the other and they're on you and you get the feeling bad then you go to criticizing and agreeing with them and God doesn't want us to do that. God wants us to understand that it's perfectly normal and natural for us to get tired and get worn out. You understand that? It's not considered weakness and the devil will use that as a weapon against you to tell you.

You're just a weak person but I'm coming to tell you today that everybody gets tired. Everybody gets worn out. Everybody gets weary. Everybody gets exhausted and you and I need to understand that so we can deal with the criticism that comes from ourselves and the enemy of our life.

We need to do that. I say it this way. Even use will become weak and tired. Young people do this and young men will fall in exhaustion.

Now when you think about this, there's another great example in the Bible that's Jesus Christ. When he was on the boat we talked about last week and there were going over to the other side. He was in the bottom of the ship resting because he was tired. God in man, he was a hundred percent man, a hundred percent God but he got tired.

And a lot of you need to understand that you're going to get tired. You're going to get worn out. Things are going to overwhelm you because you are not designed or equipped to handle a lot of of things in this life. You got to get there and admit that you can't do that.

There's some people that handle more than others. No question about that. Some people do it better than others. No question about that.

And some people can go a lot further than others can go. But the truth of the matter is when you think about it, our human strength is temporary and it fails. Every one of us, none of us are exempt from that. No preacher, nobody leadership in the church.

All of us have a problem in this area. We live in a frail body and we live in a body that can get tired and worn out. So here's what you got to do. The reason I gave you that point is I want you to stop pretending that you're super hero.

I want you to stop pretending you're super spiritual. I want you to understand that you can get tired and you can get fatigued. It's not about your weaknesses at all. It's about the fact that you're going to get tired.

You're going to get worn out. You're going to get exhausted. You're going to get overwhelmed. All of us go through that from time to time and sometimes some of us more than others.

So here's what I would say to you. You got to stop being a hypocrite in this area. You know what a hypocrite is? When you look at it in the Bible it's a pretender.

You got to stop pretending that you're a super spiritual human being. Because the truth is when you look in the Bible, all of them got tired, all of them got exhausted, all of them got overwhelmed even Jesus himself. And he was God. So you got to stop pretending and stop being a hypocrite.

Here's where you got to go. You got to admit that you have no power and that you're weak. That's important right there. Remember we gave you the first principle in celebrate, recover, and that's you got to admit that you're powerless, that you're weak, that you need the help of the Lord, right?

We get tired and we're going to get tired and the Bible deals with this. So here's what I want you to see right here. When you're running on empty, remember God gives you strength or give strength to the weak. That's why it's important for you and I not to be a hypocrite, not be a pretender.

It's important that we're truthful with God and honest with God because you're going to find out something right here that God gives strength to people who understand their weakness. He doesn't look for people who've got it all together, who do all this kind of stuff. He doesn't supply them to the Bible and ever says he supplies them with any strength at all. It says he supplies the weak people.

He makes them strong. So I say, I would say it this way. He gives power to the weak and strength to the power. Is that pretty clear?

It's to the weak. Everybody say weak. Everybody say weak again. That's who God really ministers to right there.

Now why is he saying that's right here? It's not just physical weakness. We must get to a place spiritually speaking where we realize we're pretty frail, right? That we can't handle things.

That we really can't. Now look, we can get in the flesh a little bit here and we can think we can handle things and we can be the man and we can bow up and we can do all that stuff and talk about what we're going to do. When it comes right down to it, if you want the help of God in your life and you want God being there supplying you with the strength you need, you have to come to him and you have to confess to him that you are weak. You are not strong.

You need him and I want to tell you it's not a weakness for that. I couldn't be up here doing what I'm doing. If it wasn't for the strength of the Lord. I couldn't get up every day and do what God has called me to do.

If it wasn't for the strength of the Lord. I couldn't be the husband God has called me to be. If it wasn't for the strength of the Lord. You can't be the parent that you called to be unless it's for the strength of the Lord.

Are you getting the picture? What you ought to do every minute of every day as you ought to get up and you ought to tell God, hey God, I can't handle this marriage. I can't handle these children. I can't handle this business.

It's only here because you have blessed my hand, but the truth of the matter of it is God. I couldn't do it and I couldn't make it work. If you were not there infusing me with power and strength to get the job done. We're weak people and God wants us to understand that.

I'll give you this story right here, but let me give you some insight before we get here to 2 Corinthians 12 9 and 10. I'll read the scripture in a moment, but I want to tell you what's happening right here. Now all of you know that the Apostle Paul penned this, but at the same time the Holy Spirit gave it to him, right? So God is speaking through him.

And so here's what happens when you look at the context of this scripture right here. You go look at it and Paul has had this great vision. He said, I don't know if it was a vision. I don't know if it was a dream.

I don't know if I was translated to the third heaven. It's not only what happened, but I had this supernatural experience with God. And God took me to the third heaven. By the way, the third heaven is where God resides, right?

He said he took him up there and he saw things that his mind could not even calculate. He saw things that he couldn't really explain to you. He said it was unbelievable. And things I can't even talk about.

He said I saw all this. He said it was unbelievable. Now this guy, Paul, you got to remember he wrote most of the books in the New Testament. He gave us the new covenant.

So God has used him mindily. And so God gives him all this. And so now he has this opportunity to watch this to get puffed up. Anytime God's doing something in your life, any time God is blessing you and any time God is pouring in on you, you better understand one thing.

That is you can become arrogant and you can become mindful and you can believe it was all about you, but the truth of the matter is it's all about what God's doing in your life. If God's using you in any environment whatsoever and he's doing it work in your life, you have to be careful to maintain that position of humility and weakness before God. So watch what Paul says before we get here. He says, you know that God gave me this thorn in the flesh.

And he gave me this thorn in the flesh to keep me humble because I've seen all kinds of visions and done all kinds of things for the Lord. And I know how this flesh is so God said, I'm going to give you a thorn in the flesh to keep you humble, but watch this one right here. He goes a step further. He says, he sent me a messenger from Satan.

Does anybody know what a messenger from Satan is? A demon. You got Satan and you got demons. Paul said, hey, he sends this messenger of Satan to keep me humble and to keep me weak.

Now I can really open a can of worms here and I think I feel that good today. A lot of people tell you that demons can't cross the bloodline and that demons can't control a Christian person. Well, I think all of us would agree that Paul was probably one of the most spiritual people in the New Testament. I think we would all agree that he gave the new covenant.

He understood the cross. He understood the blood. He understood Jesus. He understood all that.

He was a great Christian. But what did he have? He had a messenger of Satan. Where was it?

It was in his flesh. So what I'm trying to tell you, you and I can have some habits and hang ups and we call them habits and hang up, but there's probably a demonic activity behind all that, right? So here's Paul. He said, I prayed to God three or four times and I asked him to take this thing away from me.

He said, I went to him, I'm a genius. This thing is tormenting me in my mind. I can't handle this. Get this demon off of me.

And you know what God said to him? My grace is sufficient for you. Did you hear me? Now watch what he says right here.

This is where it continues. Each time he said, my grace is all you need. My power works best in what? What is his power work best in weaknesses?

That's why you and I have to come to him and admit we're powerless and admit that we can't do what we need to do there. Then he says this. So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses so that the power of Christ can work through me. That's why I take pleasure in my weaknesses and in the insults and the hardships and the executions and the trouble that I suffer for Christ for when I am weak, then I am strong.

Do you understand church? Why we have to find this place of humility and understand that we can't accomplish anything unless God opens the doors and let's God closes the doors and unless God promotes us. We can't do anything within ourselves. So here's what I've come to tell you.

If you have these dreams and desires and you have these things you want to do, the best place you could ever be. And it doesn't matter what area it is. It's come to a place where you can fall on your knees before Almighty God and you can tell God Lord, I can't handle this thing. I can't do this thing.

I want it this bad. I want this to happen in my life. But it's not about me God. It's about you because God says he promotes and he takes down and God said he's working in our life all the time.

We have to come from a position of weakness. If God is going to give us that strength. When you think about that, he gives us strength. He doesn't give us weakness.

He doesn't help us survive. He takes us beyond surviving. He gives power to the weak people, gives power to those who understand how frail they really are. And I'm telling you right now we are frail people.

People think it's going to be great. One minute and the next minute they can be all out of whack, right? Things can happen that way. God gives us supernatural power beyond human ability, beyond human strength.

God does that. So if you're running on him, you need to evaluate what's going on in your life. Are you trying to live this life on your own? Are you trying to get it done with your own strength?

If you do, you're going to be in trouble. If you do that, Jesus multiplies what we don't have. In your life in my life, he multiplies everything that we don't have. He tells us that all through scripture.

The point is we need the Lord. Somebody say amen. We need the Lord in our life. Here's your next scripture right here.

Philippians 4 and 13. For I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength. What is the context of that scripture right there? Paul is saying, look, here's the way it is, Church.

I've learned, he's telling the Philippian church, he said, I've learned when I don't have anything to rejoice. I've learned when I have everything to rejoice. I've learned when I have money. I got to rejoice when I don't have money.

I got to rejoice when I face persecution. I got to rejoice in the Lord. He said, I've learned to be content with everything that I have, no matter the situation that I mean. And he comes to this place of weakness and he says, look, here's the deal right here.

I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength. What is the opposite of that? I can do nothing on my own. Is anybody here in what God said?

You're running on empty a lot of times because you're trying to live life on your own. You're trying to have on your own. I've learned something about God. If I'll take my hands off of it and I'll trust God with it, God will do the work and I'm not as tired and weary as I would have been if I'd tried it the other way.

And the truth is we can accomplish some things within our own strength, no question about that, but God desires for you to go further than you are. He desires that you do more than you're doing right now. He desires that you give him glory and honor for everything that's happening in your life. He desires that.

Here's the rubable in Zechariah 4 and 6. Now here's his deal right here, the context of this. The Jerusalem has been destroyed. The temple has been destroyed, nothing there.

And God challenges the rubable to rebuild the temple. What's the rubable gets there and he looks at all the destruction around him. He looks at the temple lying there. He looks at the resources that he has.

He looks at the people that he has. He looks at the money he has. And here's where he's at. He said, God, I know you have called me to do this great work.

I understand you and I wanted me to do this great work and I want to obey you, but Lord, the truth of the matter is I don't have the resources to get this done. I don't have the strength within myself. I'm a weak man. I don't have the resources.

I don't have the people to help me. I don't know what in the world I'm going to do. So I think I can see him standing there looking at all the rubble and I think he's looking at that and I think he hangs his head and says, man, I can't do this. And some of you are there right now.

You're there with the marriage. You're there with the family. You're there with the children. You're there with the job.

You're there with your health. You're there in every area of your life. Some of you are there and you're hanging your head right now. But when I come to tell you, you are in a place of great victory when you get there because God had to orchestrate all this stuff in your life and he had to get you there.

So you would come to the place where he could infuse you with strength. Somebody ought to get happy right there when you get to the place of weakness and when you get to the place where you say, I can't do it. I can't perform it. I don't know how to get it done, Lord.

I'm in over my head. You know what I've learned? I like to tell the Lord all the time. When I wake up in the morning, I'm already in over my head, Lord, because I've learned something about God.

I'm about to get happy right here. I've learned when I get to that place where I don't depend on Dale and I don't depend on my own strength or my own ability or anything or anybody around me. I don't depend on other preachers. I don't depend on the church.

I don't depend on you. I love you and I want to serve you and I want to do everything that God has called me to do for you. But I want you to understand the one that I depend on is Jesus Christ, the one who died for me and laid his life down for me. He's the one I trust and depend on.

When you think about that, I want you to get there. Stop trying to be strong enough. Come to God weak and He will make you strong. You've got to stop trying to be strong enough.

Here's the bottom line. You've got to get honest with God. A lot of times, remember what the Bible says, we think more of ourselves than we ought to. You know how we do that?

We get cocky and arrogant. We have a little bit of success and we have a little knowledge and we have a little bit of experience and then we think that we are there. How many of you know God can take you down pretty quick? He can humble you pretty quick, right?

He has to do that. I want you to understand that. Watch this one right here. When you're running on empty, waiting on God changes everything.

When you've done all you can do, when you've given all you can give, when you've sacrificed everything you can sacrifice, when you've tied all the ends together and you've done everything that you know to do. You've done it all now you're on empty because what you want to happen is not happening. How do you deal with that? I say it begins to tell us this.

Here's what he says. But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. Isn't that good? What are you saying to me, preacher?

What does that word wait mean? It means trust. What does that trust in the Lord that you know that a form of trusting is waiting? Because the Bible says when you've done all you can do, then you ought to just stand.

Why would he say that? Because standing and waiting is trusting in God. There's nothing that speaks more volumes to God than when one of his children would just stand and wait. You can't figure out things.

You don't understand things. You don't know where to go next. You've done everything within your power God has you in miracle territory. Because what he wants you to do is learn to wait on him and trust him.

You've got to trust his timing. You've got to trust his method. And this is where we get in trouble because a lot of times it doesn't look like we want it to seem like we want it to seem it doesn't sound like we want it to sound. Things are not going the way we had it planned out in our mind.

But God said you've got to trust my method because if you trust my method, then I understand you're trusting my goodness. So God said I want you to back up and I want you to wait on me. I want you to trust me. Proverbs would go this way.

Proverbs says trusting the Lord will hold your heart. Do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will in all you do and he will show you which paths to take. You have ambition.

God may have given you that ambition. How are you going to accomplish that ambition? How are you going to do it? How are you going to follow through with that?

I'll tell you how you do it. You sit back. Now you do everything your hands find to do. You do the normal things that you do.

But you don't push. You don't stress. You don't strain. You say God I'm going to do what my hands find to do here.

I'll do it the best I can. Then I'm going to trust you and I'm going to wait on you to open the door that needs to be open in my life. You wait on him. Look, you don't rush ahead of him.

And too many times we rush ahead of God in situations. You know things will be happening and please understand we talked about the storms last week. God will allow a storm to come in your life to change your heart. He does that.

That's why storms are out there. That's the only way. You're running on empty. You can't.

Please understand this that God has allowed you to get there and allow the circumstances in your life to bring you to a place where he can do what he can do in your life. The only way sometimes he gets our attention is he has to allow us to get to a certain place so he can stop us and get our attention and talk to us and help us. Storms do that. When you're running on empty, maybe you're in an emotional storm right now.

God is trying to tell you don't get ahead of me. Don't rush ahead of me. Trust me. Trust me.

Trust me. That's what he wants to do. Don't take any shortcuts. A lot of people are bad for it.

Look, we Christians people help with this sometimes. This is a kind of situation. Maybe they haven't been giving to the Lord. I say tithing.

They haven't been given to the Lord. They've been robbing God. By the way, when you're robbed God, you're not robbing him of the money. He doesn't need the money.

He owns everything, right? He pays his streets with gold, not asphalt. Do you think he needs your money? He's spoken.

The world came into existence. He doesn't need anything you have. But the Bible says in Malachi that we robbed God. Well, what in the world was he talking about?

Listen carefully. We robbed God of opportunity to bless us. We robbed God of the opportunity to work in our life when we withhold things from God. And here's what happens in the story with this.

I've got a little side track. that when it comes to money, right? So here's where it is. God will take this family, He'll have them right where He needs them.

He'll have them right where they're about to admit that they're weak and they have trouble and they haven't been doing it God's way. He'll get them right there, he'll work for months and months and months again. And some of you good God let people come along and bail them out and mess up everything God was trying to do. You have to be careful when you start trying to bail people out because God is doing something in their life.

God doesn't want them depending on you. He doesn't want them depending on the church. He wants them depending on him. Somebody say amen.

It works that way Psalms 47 will say it this way. Wait patiently for the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord.

He said it twice here. You gotta wait. You gotta trust God's time and you gotta quit doing all the stuff and freaking out and going here and running here and going on and two and fro God said, just wait. How many of you know it's better when God does it than it is when you do it?

How many understand that? It's better to wait on the Lord. I understand we are people who have very little patients right here, but God is trying to teach us something in this scripture here, watch Hebrews. And it is impossible to please God without faith.

That word faith meets trust. Anyone who wants to come to Him must believe that God exists and watch this. And He is a rewarder of those who sincerely seek Him. Do you know one of the more serious ways that you seek God is by waiting?

Think about that. If you move ahead, if you take a shortcut, if you go that way, then you're not waiting on God. You're not trusting Him. But what I learned through all this right here simply is this and that is if I wait on the Lord, I'm really saying in a very powerful way that I'm really sincerely seeking Him.

I don't want to move because I don't know what God wants me to do. I don't want to go over there. I'm waiting on God. I want God's best.

I want God's will. I want God's blessing on everything that I do. So I'm going to wait. And one of the greatest things you'll ever do to honor God is wait because here's what God knows.

When you're waiting, you're really saying to Him, I trust you and I'm not going to take another step without you. It's got to be your way and not my way. When you get that, get this right here. Stop running ahead of God, wait on Him, trust Him, and watch Him renew your strength.

That's where it is right there. You got to do that. Now, when you think about that, when you're running on it, you remember the secret is the source. The secret to you overcoming and winning is the source.

It's not what happens all around you. It's what happens in your heart. This is the secret to winning right here. I say, I'll pull all these scriptures together out here.

He gives power to the weak and strength to the powerless. Even use will become weak and tired. Young men will fall in exhaustion. But those who trust in the Lord will find new strength.

There it is right there. Those who wait on the Lord will find new strength. Those who trust in the Lord will find new strength. They will soar high on wings like eels.

They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not think. That's God's word right there. So what did He say?

He said, look, I'm going to give you strength if you trust me and if you wait on me. I'm going to give you that strength. We want His strength, not our strength. There's anybody in there right here.

I don't want to operate in my own strength. So when you see that, I want you to think about the statements all the time. And I hope you remember them. And I hope you remember them.

If you'll write them down and study on them, God will reveal some things to you. We try to live the Christian life in our own strength, willpower, discipline, efforts. We wonder why we are exhausted. I want to ask you a real question.

Have you ever been or are you exhausted trying to live this Christian life? Come on. Give me, let me see it right here. Just three, four, five, six, seven, eight, 10 of you.

Save real good. You understand the process. The truth of the matter is you can be exhausted trying to live this Christian life. I did it for years.

I trust in religion rather than trusting in God. I trusted in what I did, rather than trusting in what Christ has already done. I trusted in the church, I trusted in the preacher, I trusted in the prophets and the evangelists, I trusted them all, I trusted them all, abilities and strength, I've done it all, that's religious works right there. God is trying to bring us to a place where we have faith in one thing and one thing only.

So when you see that, here's what I would say, how do we tap into God's strength? Everybody say proper faith. Everybody say proper faith. Now listen, it's important that we wait.

It's important that we realize that we're not the only one, there's some reasons for all those. It's important that we understand the source, but so you can do all that and have improper faith and the Holy Spirit can't work in your life, the strength can't come. You gotta have proper faith. So here's what Galatian says about that.

My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. He's dead to himself. Now you got that?

He's dead to himself. He said Christ, now he is in me. I'm not trying to do it. I'm not trying to have it.

I'm not trying to use my disciplines. I'm not trying to be spiritual. I'm trusting in what Christ has done. It's no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me.

So I live in this earthly body about what? By trusting everybody watches now, in the Son of God, everybody say, Jesus Christ, who loved me and gave himself for me, the finished work on the cross of Calvary. So what is Paul saying right here? He said, look, I'm trusting in the Lord, and I'm trusting in what he did.

Because I don't understand if I trust in what he did, the Holy Spirit will do the work in my life. But if I don't trust him and what he did, the Holy Spirit is out. And the Holy Spirit, by the way, is the only one that can do anything in this world, spiritually speaking, that has any spiritual value whatsoever. You can change your address, you can change your attitude, you can dress it up another way, you can change everywhere you go, and you start going to new places, but guess what, all that's temporary.

There's no change on the inside. And God is a God that wants to change on the inside, so it manifests itself on the outside. The principle here is this right here in Romans 18, 2. For the law of the Spirit of life, this is a law, this is a principle, this is how God works.

When you think about the law, think about the word principle, because there are principles all through the word of the Lord. And a principle is something that God has established from the beginning, he doesn't change. The principle is the way that things are supposed to be done. So watch what he says right here.

The law of the Spirit of life, capital S, that's the Holy Spirit, everybody say that, Holy Spirit, Holy Spirit, say it again. So the principle of the Holy Spirit, in Christ. When you got saved, where were you? In Christ.

When you said yes to the Lord, you were in Christ. Every time you read the word in Christ, in your Bible from this day forward, it's simply talking about faith in him and what he did. You can't be in Christ without the cross, right? It took the cross to get us in Christ.

It takes our faith in the cross to get us in Christ. So here, here he goes, he said, the Holy Spirit along with our faith in Christ has made me free from the law of sin and death, the two most powerful laws in the universe. How are you going to deal with sin in your life? Now let me ask you a question.

How many of you would say, preacher, I got some sin in my life today? Y'all not that saved. Y'all not that saved. Your preacher's got sin in his life.

Am I proud of that? No. I want to boast about that absolutely not. Am I ashamed of it?

Absolutely I am. But the truth is, all of us have it. Remember the apostle Paul, he said, the things I want to do, I can't do it, the things I know I should do, I'm not do it. He said, oh, what a wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this life of sin.

That was the apostle Paul that had the great vision, the great revelation. He was the one that God used, mightily in the New Testament to give us the new covenant. He was a man of God. He had this great encounter on the road to Damascus where he was not to his feet.

And he had this great deal with God, and he saw God there. He was a man of God, he loved God. But he said, I have some problems in my life. Well, if he had problems, we all got problems.

And that doesn't justify the problem. Somebody say amen. Sin is sin and sin is wrong. And you and I are to hate sin, and it ought to work in our life this way.

When we fall short of God, we look in his word and what's going on in our life. When we see that, you and I ought to hate that thing. We ought to talk to God about that thing, because here it is, remember weakness. It's where God gives you strength.

If you try to handle it in your own strength, then you're not displaying the weakness in your life. But if you go to God and you say, God, this is in my life. I don't like it there. It's in your word and it shouldn't be a part of my life.

But I'm struggling here, Lord. I'm weak, the flesh is weak, but the spirit is willing. So God, I need the Holy Spirit to take this out of my life. And I've come to give you this testimony today that God will work it out in your life every single time.

If you'll go to him with proper faith, somebody give God a shout of praise if you know what I'm talking about. If the Holy Spirit doesn't work it out, it's not work now. You may dress it up a little bit. Some of y'all put that old man in the casket behind you.

Wherever you go, you're taking with you. Cause you think I might need to use him. I'm gonna be good on Sunday morning. I'm gonna be good Monday through Friday.

But when somebody licks the red off my candy, I want him close by so I can open the casket and say, get him and then that old self comes out. Somebody say amen if I'm telling you to drink. Well, God doesn't want you to do it that way. Let the old man stay where he is and let God do something great in your life.

Depend on Jesus Christ and his finished work and watch the Holy Spirit work in your life. That's the only way he can work. The Bible says that we can stop the Holy Spirit. We can quench the Holy Spirit.

We can do all kinds of things. But God said, there's one way you can't stop him. If you'll keep that faith in Jesus and one he did and you'll trust that alone and depend on that, the Holy Spirit will run to your rescue and he'll do the work in your life. Now we pray because it connects us to the power source, right?

We told God, nothing wrong with pray. We ought to pray and pray all through it and pray as much as you can. Now if you pray and you think it gives you merit with God in some way you're wrong because don't think it gives you merit with God is what Jesus did on the cross of Calvary and your faith in it. See all of us pray differently.

Some of you can sit down and pray and you can pray for hours and hours and hours and hours. There are people that can do that. How many of you in this book though, you can sit down and pray and after about five minutes you don't know where to go. So if it was based on prayer, some of us would be in trouble, right?

It's not based on that, it's based on faith in Jesus Christ and what he did. You read your word. You read the Bible because it's spiritual food. It's the bread of life.

You read that. You're nourished by that. We read it and we do what God said. Do they, we worship God because it connects us to God.

When this praise thing was singing earlier, boy I was over there. I was thinking God I need to be connected to you today. I worship you and I praise you and I thank you for everything you've done in my, I'm talking to God over there. When I'm praying, I mean, when you see my hands up, I'm telling God I'm a filthy rag thing.

I'm just like Paul, I don't know why you try to use me and you chose to use me. I don't understand all that. I'm weak, I'm not strong, but God, I'm strong in you. And I mean, I'm talking to God about it all.

That's my worship. Your worship may be different, but the point is we worship so we can get connected with God. Do you know that we come to church? Because God told us to come to church.

You know why I told you to come to church? Now some of them watch it online out there. You live a little bit of rain and stuff. You know I'm gonna preach on you today.

Fair weather Christians. And some people have even gotten to the point a lot of Christians that church is irrelevant. That I can have my own relationship with the Lord. I can read my Bible at home and me and the Lord can get along fine and I'm going to heaven.

Well I want to challenge that because my Bible says as iron sharpens iron, so to men sharpen men. And if you're not around any men and around any women at home, how are you gonna be sharper? That's why you still act like you at. People like porcupines, they find you, you get up close to them, they're sticky.

And when they stick you ugly comes out. Well, how are you gonna go to what ugly is in there if you stay at home and say, your religious cocoon over there somewhere. I wish somebody helped me preach right there. I'm coming to where, you know here's what I say.

Wolves identify sheep that are on the fringe. Think about what I'm about to tell you. Now when you study wolves, here's what you'll find out. They're not going in the midst of the sheep where the shepherd is, he's standing in the middle of them.

They're looking for that one that's on the fringe out there. And we got too many Christians on the fringe and they've allowed the devil to convince them that being with the rest of the sheep is irrelevant. You know what, that is that's pride and arrogance. And the reason that's pride and arrogance is simply is they think they can live their life isolated and without people with God, no where in his words and we could be isolated or not around other people, right?

No where in his words. In fact, he told us to assemble ourselves together, not to stop that thing, it's important. So when you look at the Bible and you understand that, sheep, here's what'll happen. The wolf is out there looking.

And by the way, when he's studying you and he's looking at you, he's already got a plan. You might see him and he might be standing there looking at you and he's like, okay, I'm okay. That wolf has already studied you. He studied where the shepherd is, he studied where the sheep are, where their congregated at and he picks you out and he identifies you and you become a perfect target for the wolf out there.

And how many of you know the wolf is the devil himself? I'm gonna tell you what we better do. We better run to God's house and I want to be right there in the middle where everybody is. I want them all around me because he's got to go through a whole lot to get to me.