Well, hello everyone and welcome again to another edition of the focus of freedom here on WVLR television. C-T-N for Eastern Tennessee. It's just a joy to be here with you. We're very humbled and blessed to be here and we appreciate the folks here allowing us this blessing and we appreciate you being there.
If you haven't seen this before, really my name is irrelevant Mike Sage. The most relevant name there is in the universe we all know is the name of the Lord Jesus, Philippians 2 God's given him a name above every name. One of these days every knee is going to bow and every tongue is going to confess that he is the Lord to the glory of God the Father. I hope you know him and I hope then that you are humbly, honestly, fervently following him and striving each day to increase your faith.
Like we said the last time we worked together, we don't want to be those of no faith. We don't want to be those of little faith. We want to be those of great faith. And if our faith level goes up, the fear level will come down, the faith level comes down, the fear level goes up.
So if you're one of these Americans right now thinking, oh goodness what am I going to do? If that President reign honey, the King of kings and Lord of lords is reigning in your heart, I hope and pray. And you've got victory through him. He said in John 14, because I live ye shall live also.
Preach Jesus. Not another Jesus like old Paul talked about to them there in Corinth, but the true and the living God, the Lord Jesus Christ, only one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. So to him be all glory and from him to us comes all grace. It's been a joy being saved.
I was saved when I was just a youngster, basically 13 years old, raised in a home that was not a home of faith. Now my grandmother was a lady of faith and my mother went to church, but my dad didn't and I was exposed to the sinful lifestyle, I guess, of the mountains of the Highlands area here in Tennessee, in Virginia, Kentucky, and North Carolina. But I had a little classmate in the seventh grade that was a devout Christian. She loved the Lord.
Her first name was Dottie. And she was not afraid to testify to this little cuffs mouth smart elit. I was a terrorized my teachers. I'm ashamed of that.
You know, when I hear the preacher talk about the testimony of being in the world, I don't recognize ever in the world. I was headed that way. I promise you that. But God intersected my path with a little, blessed little 13-year-old Christian that loved the Lord, helped her mom teach Sunday school.
I found out later on a Sunday afternoon drive one Sunday with the family. We ran into a horrific horrible automobile accident in a little town called Chilhawi, Virginia. And that was in May of, it was on Mother's Day actually of 1967. And it was just horrible and several fatalities.
And we went by the scene and I knew Dottie's mom's car. But it was some angle. I didn't even recognize it until the next morning. You know, that was 1967, man.
We didn't have cell phones and all that stuff. And so I didn't know what got to the Marion Junior High School at the time. It was Marion Middle School now in Marion, Virginia. That little classmate and friend was in that automobile.
And they had rushed her faces. They could back in those days to run up Memorial Hospital in Roanoke. And those kids got together and, you know, we try to pray. It seemed like in a crisis we do turn our attention to God, word, don't we?
We have a tendency to do that. And it's like in Psalms 23, he had been talking about the shepherd. Until he got down, you know, the Lord is my shepherd, I want you to know. Talking about the shepherd, till he got down into the valley of the shadow of death.
And then he said, now art with me. So there's something about troubles and trials that will get us as a human being to stop talking about God and start talking directly to God. Now as young as we didn't know much about prayer, we just, but we believed in God. And I never will forget this.
She had asked me to be saved. She had asked me to come to church. She had talked to me about things of faith. And I sort of pushed you off.
I was a little smart, but you know, when I'd get in bed at night, even as a youngster like that, I wouldn't make fun of her in front of my buddies trying to be a big guy. I knew that Dottie had someone that my grandi had talked about. And so I remember telling God, you know, you try to bargain with God sometimes. I said, God, if you'll just let Dottie live, and this is a crude thing and I don't want to be sound ignorant, but it's just honest because it's applicable to so many down through the years that I've seen in the ministry for the last almost half a century.
I told God, I had a problem. I'd be honest. I was a custom author, a little Dickens. They talk about kids cussing today.
I think he never did. They cuss like, oh, well, Brother Mike and I'm tea right now. I can lay out some cussing. That just made me feel big, you know.
And the short-income brother teachers have gotten the mouth slapped. And then I, Mom and Daddy went to sue the school. I tell you, all they'd had to do was say, oh, Mikey, there's cussing. That's what'd be good.
And so things have changed that I told the Lord. I said, God, if you let Dottie live. You know, trying to bargain with God and to get something from God. So you give something to God.
And I done pretty good on that Wednesday morning through lunch, gym, all that. Blinds and work. But then, going into the last period, between the fifth and sixth period, I was standing at my locker, getting my books changed around. And old buddy of mine, it's still a buddy of mine here after all these years.
Ducky's shoulder, you know how little old kids are in middle school. And he'd come running to me. I didn't see any blinds. I knocked my books out of my hand.
Almost knocked me down. Well, buddy, I'll tell you what. I forgot about my promise to God. And I put a cussing on old Johnny.
And just as I started, and I said, uh oh, uh oh, I'm in trouble. And I worried about that, going home, worried about that. All that Wednesday night. And on Thursday morning, when we got to school, we found out that Dottie had died.
And I thought without a question, she died because I wasn't strong enough to quit cussing. And winter funeral on Saturday. And they seated as kids at Mount Pleasant Church over in Midway, Virginia. We never went to church much, Eastern Christmas and things like that, special occasion.
And as kids sat in the part of the side of the choir. And the choir got to singing. An old hymn, I'm going to a city where the rose has never fade. Here they bloom for a season and their beauty is decayed.
But I'm going to a city where the rose has never fade. And the Holy Spirit knocked the minister to me. And I never did really see the underlying meaning or the typology or whatever in songs or prose or poems or anything. But the Holy Spirit spoke to my heart and said, son, you're headed down the road, following your daddy and all that and carrying on.
And the roses in this life, they made bloom for a little while. But then they decayed and the beauty is gone. It's all foods go. It's all alive.
But the roses in Jesus, like Dottie had, never fade. And some ladies on the front row of the choir. And I never seen Shouton before in church. And this was a funeral.
And the family was devastated. There was grief and sorrow everywhere. And they were forgetting some white-headed ladies on the front row of that old church choir. And they got to do a yes.
Whoo! And I don't know if you want any world. But there was such a spirit and an atmosphere of peace in the midst of all that. There seemed to be comfort resting on the family in the midst of their sorrow.
And I looked through the flowers from my vantage point and I could see Dottie's beautiful little radiant face there in her body. And the Holy Spirit asked me a question. Like if that was your body in that case, right now? Where would your soul be?
And I knew without any question or argument I'd be in hell. And I knew both. I stopped breathing out. And I was a horse-plotted.
Couldn't even stop cussing. I mean, I was confused as a little boy. But I told my mom that it went to bed. I said, I want to go to church in the morning.
And I found myself in the boys' middle school class, Sunday school. And the teacher's name was Ella Cagley. She's still to this day. Now she's 94 years old, I believe.
But she's a member of Freedom to Have an Apple Baptist Church where I passed her to this day. And we'd been like family all these years. And I didn't even know her then. And usually when I would show up to Sunday school and she'd just miss the class, it's just like somebody would put a big old vacuum cleaner nozzle some outside door and all that stuff was out to door.
And to play or whatever. But that morning I had to stand around this little bit and I was the last day out and took Ms. Cagley by the hand shaking her. She shook hands with all of it.
And I didn't know what to say. My heart was beating down the chest. And she said, Mike, what's wrong? I said, Ms.
Cagley, I want to get saved today. And she said, well, now, Mike, the Lord will save you right here right now. And she got excited. She's headed to Word of the Banched about now and she'll be saved.
Here come the devil, that little lion devil. And he said, you couldn't even stop cussing. Pitman's your friend, live it. You know good and well, you can't live for God.
You know good and well, you can't make it. You know good and well, you a max lion. I tell you what, Max age, why don't you just pretend you get saved day, go on in and live your life. And if you can stop sinning and don't sin before next Sunday, then you come back and say, well, I relayed that message to Ms.
Cagley. I said, I said, Ms. Cagley, let's just pretend I get saved this morning. And I'll go and if I can quit sin, and now I didn't tell her what I was thinking, I'll quit cussing.
I'll come back next Sunday and get saved. Thank God for a godly spirit lead, boy's junior high Sunday school teacher. She smiled, she didn't argue, she didn't rebuke me. You know what she did?
She just reached over gently and closed the Sunday school class door. And I've told people for a long time, I said, I knew that, I knew then the devil was out in the hall. Because when Ms. Cagley closed that door, she closed it right in the devil's face and I didn't hear him anymore.
And she didn't ask me. She said, Mac, may I right there at that bench? And we're going to call on God. And you're going to ask the Lord to save you because he's convicted of you sin.
And we bow down there and she opened this blessed old book, the Bible. Lated out there on that little bench and we got on her knees and that little concrete floor. And she went down the scriptures and she read several scriptures and put her arm around the shoulders and she said, Mac, when I'm praying, you ask God to save you. You don't have to pray out loud or anything like that unless you want to.
But I'm telling you, you call it on the name of the Lord and you ask him to save your soul. You know, you're a sinner. You know, Jesus died to pay for your sin debt and you trust him and you're saved. You're taking him into your heart asking to forgive you and you can be saved.
And she had read me the scripture. Well, I prayed. I just said, Lord, I'm lost. I'm going to hell.
I want you to save me. I know you died for me. I know you come out of that grave like you said and you live and I want you to save myself. Well, about that time that great feeling in my life, peace took away all the worry, all that big worry about cussing didn't work out.
I say, I had to wait on Ms. Cagley to finish praying. She just kept right on the praying there. And finally she said, Amen.
And she looked me right now and she said, Mike, are you saved? And I was kind of timid in ways a little bit in front of the oops and things. And she put me on the spot there and I said, but it didn't take long. I don't know where it come from.
I found out later come from the indwelling Holy Spirit. If you were with the heart man, believe it or rises, with mouth confessions made on salvation. When she said, are you saved, Mike? I said, yes ma'am.
She said, how do you know you are? I said, I thought of me. I looked in her face and looked at the Bible. I know I said, Ms.
Cagley. I said, I don't know how I know. She said, well, now you tell me how you know. I said, I don't know how I know.
What do you know that you know? I said, well, yeah, I know that I know. What she tell me? How do you know that you know?
I said, I don't know how I know that I know. But you know, yes, how you know? I don't know how I know. And she just about ready to kill my joy.
She said, you got to tell me how you know, Mike. Ms. P's come over and put my finger right there on the verse of scripture. And I said, Ms.
Cagley said, whoever calls on the Lord, she'll be saved. I said, I just called on him. So Ms. Cagley, I know how I know because it says, so right there you shall be saved.
She heard me a real time. She said, boy, that's exactly the right answer. Don't you ever forget it. And she's been my wonderful friend all these years.
And bless her heart. She's getting a older than now. And to be quite honest, she's wanting to go on to heaven, but what a soldier of the cross to know down through these years. You're watching.
Are you saved? Do you know that you know that you have eternal life? If you're saved, you're a member of our Lord's Church. And we've been talking on the several past episodes here, the last three of the focus of freedom, that the Lord's Church in America needs humility and unity.
We're going to move on if the Lord allows us in the weeks to come, talk a little bit about prophecy, maybe because so many people are asking me about signs of the times, about the end of the world, about the coming of Christ and all that. And Jesus spoke a lot about prophecy in two primary chapters, as you know, the Temple Discourse in Luke 21, the Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24. It's always been interesting to me when you get ready to read about the Temple Discourse where Jesus had ridden the donkey into Jerusalem and he went into the Temple through Passion Week. And then they come to him there in the Temple in Luke 21.
And they ask him in verse 6, I know, you know, when would these things be, the days will come and they were asking him about, you know, how things are going to be when the end of the time comes there in verse 7. And I'm actually going to mention it, but when should these things be, and what sign will there be when these things shall come to pass? Before you can ever really get down into the essence of what Jesus was saying about prophetic things and about the happenings through the Church Age or the Dispensation of Grace, I think it's very, very interesting that a little thing happened right before then and I'll relate it to you. Jesus and the disciples, they saw a certain poor widow casting in two nights, just a couple of little pennies, not much.
And all the different people were casting their gifts into the treasury in verse 1. And Jesus said of a truth, I say unto you, that this poor widow have cast in more than they all. What was going on there, of course it was a high feast day and lots of folks were around the Temple and I guess to compare it to today's terms, it would be just like some successful wealthy people, that would be around some event and this was a religious event of course. So they were taking up the arms and the offerings and the tithes and all that.
And so Jesus, you know, as a lesson, he said, who's given the most, who do you think's given the most? Now can you imagine on today's world, oh man, I know this guy, he owns several corporations, he's got over here, he's a big fat cat, he's got all kinds of money, all kinds of holmen. Jesus, they've been probably millions of dollars come into the office of Capissant and Aniston, all the Temple and all that and the high priest and the priesthood, but we don't know which one gave the most. Can you imagine they were surprised when Jesus pointed at that poor little bit over with a lot of people, not only said, he didn't say she gave the most, he said she gave more than all of them put together.
Now Tysin, what we've been talking about, if I keep a whole lot, the amount of myself that I keep to me doesn't allow any room for the absolute lordship of Christ, my surrender and my submission. If I surrender half of myself, that leaves 50% of myself for me and ground that would be fertile for backsliding into carnality, being deceived by the devil, to be like the layover to see a church, sincerely think I'm rich and increase with good to have nothing and not even realize my true condition of being poor by a miserable wretched naked, then all those other folks that left there, they gave a small portion of the totality of all that they had. But that one little little woman, it might only been two mites, it might only been just a little bit, but she was leaving those temple grounds with nothing but her faith in God. I'm not advocating that we all go out here and sell everything we got and give all the money to the poor like Jesus said to that rich young ruler.
I don't think Jesus would have literally had him do that, but spiritually and mentally, what we give to God creates a solidification of our faith to him and our emotions and as we think in our hearts, so are we? So if I think spiritually, the Holy Spirit then reigning in ruling in my life, my emotions are in check. And the more that I give of myself to him, there leaves no room for the devil and the flesh to play with. My trust is in him, I trust him for everything that he's given me.
If I've got one talent, I want to make it two. If I've got two, I want to make it four. I want to occupy it all he comes. And when that little little woman left that temple area that day, Jesus told them, that lady has given more than everybody here put together because she gave the total sum of what she had, representing the surrender of who she was and the absolute submission to everything and every person in God.
In Jesus, do you get that little lesson? It's an amazing truth and amazing lesson. And that goes along with true, biblically based humility. Pride makes me keep back some of me.
Then I start back down in that area where Jesus cleared out of sin and all of that and I start picking up some of those old characteristics of the first Adam and therefore manifesting and improving that through conduct. If I've got ten talents and I keep nine of them to myself, then I'm not going to occupy means business. Occupy means makes money. Occupy means advance and progress and expand.
Jesus said occupy till I come. We need to be soul winners. We need to be dispensing love and grace and mercy and forgiveness and power solidified in our security being based in Him, our faith being placed in Him. All those other wealthy people, they maintained a whole lot of their stuff and it was not pleasing to God.
Pride, the proud look is the first thing that God hates in Proverbs 6 as we've said and through the pen of James and Peter again, God resists the proud, gives grace to the humble. I don't know about you, but Jesus saved my soul and he's the only one who could save me and we love him because he first loved us and if it's a burden to give everything that you are to him, something's wrong because we know that he gave everything he is to us. He completely drained himself and cashed out every part of himself for us on that cross. He made himself of no reputation, became obedient in the death, even the death of the cross in Philippians 2.
Wherefore God hath highly exalted him. He didn't think it robbery to be equal with God. That was his security and his confidence. But from based on that, the surrender and the servitude of Christ, he became a servant.
He made himself of no reputation. And because of that, God exalted him. That little woman left that temple area that day with nothing in her hand, but a whole lot of faith in her heart. Don't you reckon that Jesus saw to it that she had suffered that night?
Don't you think Jesus saw to it that she had something to put on the next morning? Jesus said, consider the sparrows and consider the lilies. There Solomon wouldn't clothe like these lilies boys and those little sparrows, the lilies Solomon didn't dress like that. These little sparrows, my father feeds everyone of them and you all are more important to us than them.
And the Lord is the Son and Holy Spirit. God shall supply all your need according to his riches and glory by Christ Jesus, Philippians 419. Before we talk about Jesus coming in the clouds, let's get excited about what he did on the cross. Because Jesus ain't saved any soul because of what he's going to do.
I got saved, you got saved if you are, and if you aren't saved, you can be saved, not as a result of what Jesus is going to do, but as a result of what he's already done, in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. So every day, would you join me and let's honestly try to be more like that little witter woman. And not even too much, but she give everything she had to him because she knew by faith in a cross, the cross that Jesus would give everything he has for her. Wow, he has given everything he has to me.
So it is a joy to give everything that we have to him. Is it not? Bless his name. Well, we thank you for watching.
Come by the website ftministries.org. Check us out there. Download the app. Freedom tabernacle app from any app store, absolutely free.
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Now, God bless you and then may he use you for his glory every single solitary day of your life. Let's do everything to his glory. And in addition to doing what we're doing and who we are for his glory, we would be a blessing to someone else. God bless you.
I have the privilege of pastoring and being the director of Freedom tabernacle Baptist Church and Freedom tabernacle ministries in Atkins, Virginia. And we are going to get to know one another a lot better through the weeks and months to come is my prayer. But right now, you can join us on our Facebook page, Freedom tabernacle ministries, Atkins, Virginia, or our YouTube channel, Focus of Freedom Atkins, Virginia, our website, ftministries.org. Or you can download our app, the Freedom tabernacle app, download it for free from any app store and we can stay in contact that way.
As we labor together with our Lord for his glory and for the advancement of his glory,